Facebook to launch child 'panic button'

Facebook and other social-networking sites are to join the likes of Bebo in installing a 'panic button', reports claims.

The button will allow children to report offensive, obscene and inappropriate material, and is expected to be taken on by a number of internet firms in an announcement due tomorrow from the UK Council for Child Internet Safety (UKCCIS).

The announcement is expected from Tanya Byron, the government's adviser on online safety, with the Sunday Times saying schools secretary Ed Balls and home secretary Alan Johnson are also expected to attend the launch.

The guidelines are expected to encourage parents to take greater control over their children's use of the internet.

A Whitehall source told the Telegraph: 'We are encouraging parents to make sure their children use the computer in a common room in the house.

'This is all about getting parents involved, what they know online, how they can manage that and how they can be more aware of what they can do such as better protection controls.'

Facebook flirts propositioning doctors

Facebook is being used by patients to send flirty messages to their doctors, the Medical Defence Union (MDU) has said today.

The MDU is warning medics not to respond to the 'amorous approaches' of their patients, saying it would be 'wholly inappropriate' to do so.

The medical organisation said they were aware of a number of cases where patients had propositioned doctors, by sending them an unsolicited message on Facebook, or other social networking sites.

The MDU advises that responding to patients in this way may be seen as overstepping the professional boundary of the doctor/patient relationship.

Dr Emma Cuzner, MDU medico-legal adviser, whose article on the hidden dangers of social networking appears in the latest edition of the MDU Journal, said: 'The pitfalls posed to doctors using social networking sites by inadvertently breaching confidentiality or posting unprofessional content, such as photos, have been well documented. But doctors may be less prepared for patients using sites like Facebook to ask them out on a date.

'Some doctors have told the MDU they feel it would be rude not to reply, if only to politely refuse, but given that this is not a professional route of communication, any correspondence of this sort would clearly stray outside the doctor/patient relationship.'

In one case highlighted in the MDU Journal, a female GP was asked out for a drink by a patient as she left her surgery. When she declined, the patient started pestering the doctor via Facebook and sent her a bunch of her favourite flowers, lilies, which he had ascertained from her freely available Facebook page. The MDU said they helped the GP nip the patient's advances in the bud, and also suggested she considered employing some of the security and privacy settings on the site.

In a separate study in the journal, Karen Roberts, MDU clinical risk manager, reviews claims and complaints about women's health made against GPs.

During the five-year period of the study, there were 48 complaints about the use, or more usually the absence, of a chaperone for an intimate examination. The majority of complainants alleged an inappropriate examination had taken place or that no chaperone was offered, although six patients complained about the presence of a chaperone or that the doctor would not perform the examination without one.

The MDU advises doctors that, as well as offering a chaperone for intimate examinations (of the breast, genital or rectum), communication is often the key to avoiding such complaints.

Dr Cuzner added: 'We are advising our members about the importance of keeping relationships with patients on a professional footing. This is in line with doctors' ethical duties not to pursue improper relationships with patients. Doctors could face a GMC investigation if they are accused of overstepping the boundary.

'They have a duty to maintain the public trust in the profession at all times, in their professional and private lives and not only when at their place of work.'

Twitter voted best English word of 2009

Twitter has been voted the top English word of the year by a survey of internet trends.

The micro-blogging site knocked Obama off the top and beat words such as H1N1, Hadron, and vampire.

Other popular words such as stimulus and deficit were related to the financial crisis.

The announcement comes from the Global Language Monitor which monitors the media, internet, and databases to see how often subjects are bought up.

Of the top 15 words eight were connected to the global economic crisis including bonus and unemployment.

The top phrase was King of Pop with Obama-mania coming in a close second.

Paul JJ Payack, president of the Global Language Monitor, said: 'In a year dominated by world-shaking political events, a pandemic, the after effects of a financial tsunami and the death of a revered pop icon, the word Twitter stands above all the other words.

'Twitter represents a new form of social interaction, where all communication is reduced to 140 characters.'

He added: 'Being limited to strict formats did wonders for the sonnet and haiku. One wonders where this highly impractical word-limit will lead as the future unfolds.'

The Texas based organisation defines twitter as the ability to encapsulate human thought in 140 characters.

Online transformation for internet addresses

The online world is due to undergo a transformation as the internet regulator moves to change non-Latin script web addresses.

The timing of the move is poignant, with yesterday marking 40 years of email. Today's announcement will be the biggest change to the way the internet works since it was first created.

At its annual meeting in Seoul the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers board (Icann) said the first internet addresses containing non-Latin characters from start to finish will soon be online, 'thanks to today's approval of the new Internationalized Domain Name Fast Track Process' by Icann.

Domain names will be allowed in Arabic and Chinese, as well as other scripts, allowing much easier internet use for the more than half of the 1.6 billion people who use the internet but who speak languages with non-Latin script.

Icann said their Fast Track Process launches on November 16th, and will allow nations and territories to apply for internet extensions reflecting their name – and made up of characters from their national language.

If the applications meet criteria that includes government and community support and a stability evaluation, the applicants will be approved to start accepting registrations.

'The coming introduction of non-Latin characters represents the biggest technical change to the internet since it was created four decades ago,' said Icann chairman Peter Dengate Thrush.

'Right now internet address endings are limited to Latin characters – A to Z. But the Fast Track Process is the first step in bringing the 100,000 characters of the languages of the world online for domain names.'

'This is only the first step, but it is an incredibly big one and an historic move toward the internationalization of the internet,' added Rod Beckstrom, Icann's president and CEO.

Google sees profits up 27% for third quarter

Google has reported their profits soared 27 per cent when compared to last year, recording a net profit of £1 billion for the third quarter.

Chief executive of the search engine Eric Schmidt said he believed the worst of the global financial crisis was now behind us.

He announced today that the firm had seen a seven per cent surge in revenue to over £3.64 billion, saying: 'While there is a lot of uncertainty about the pace of economic recovery, we believe the worst of the recession is behind us and now feel confident about investing heavily in our future.'

The firm have weathered the financial crisis thanks to revenue from online advertising. Shares in the company were up around two per cent in after-hours trading.

Google's third-quarter results beat Wall Street expectations.

UK leads fight against internet child abuse

The UK is leading the way in removing child abuse images from the internet, new research has shown.

The Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) has today marked its third Awareness Day with the publication of new data showing more people than ever are using its hotline to report potentially illegal content on the internet.

Despite receiving over 27,000 reports – a five per cent increase on the same period last year – only one in five (5,742) were confirmed by the IWF as images of child sexual abuse.

The figure has been falling for three years suggesting a decrease in the availability of the content on the internet.

And almost all of the images (over 99 per cent) were traced to servers outside the UK.

The IWF claims as a result of its consistent efforts, and those by the internet industry, it is now extremely rare for child sexual abuse images to be on UK websites.

When they are, the IWF works in partnership with the hosting provider and the police to have them removed.

During the first three quarters of this year, the IWF has issued 25 notices to companies in the UK about the abuse of their networks for the distribution of these images.

Each notice was complied with and every identified instance of online child sexual abuse content in the UK was removed within a day of notification.

Commenting on the figures, Eve Salomon, IWF chair, said: 'With the help of our hotline, the UK has an excellent record in eradicating child sexual abuse images on the internet in partnership with 35 other hotlines around the world and with the support of our 100 industry members.

'These websites are reducing in number globally and where they are sited in the UK, they are removed extremely quickly.

'If you stumble across child sexual abuse images, it's crucial you report it to us. We are focussed on the swift removal of these images and helping the international effort to bring those responsible to justice and rescue children from sexual exploitation.'

Sarah Brown left "bemused" by Bruni sketch

Sarah Brown has admitted being left 'a bit bemused' by an illustration of herself on the new website of French first lasy Carla Bruni.

The site was launched on Wednesday and immediately crashed due to the number of people attempting to log on.

Included on the site are a series of sketches by illustrator Alice Dechelette of international figures including Nelson Mandela, Barack Obama and his wife Michelle, and Mrs Brown.

The prime minister's wife wrote about her thoughts on the sketch on the micro-blogging site Twitter.

'Love Carla Bruni Sarkozy's new website though bit bemused by illustration of me,' she wrote.

She later added she was 'bemused in a good way'.

Mrs Brown has become something of a celebrity on Twitter and now has over 835,000 followers, almost 100,000 more than her husband Gordon Brown.

London leads fake World Cup ticket crackdown

Specialist detectives from the Metropolitan police have closed more than 100 websites selling counterfeit tickets for next year's World Cup, it has been claimed.

According to the Times, the London-based e-Crime Unit has helped save tens of thousands of fans from buying bogus tickets.

Fifa called in New Scotland Yard after uncovering a raft of fake websites springing up claiming to sell official tickets.

Half a million fans are expected to descend on South Africa next summer for the tournament, where three million tickets for 64 matches are on sale.

The Fifa website is the only place to buy official tickets, although some are being sold as part of a package to tour operators.

Jerome Valcke, Fifa general secretary, told the Times: 'Our work with New Scotland Yard is yet another example that we are taking serious steps to stop unauthorised entities from selling tickets to the 2010 Fifa World Cup.

'We applaud the work of New Scotland Yard in its efforts to ensure that our common goal is to target and shut down illegitimate entities or unauthorised tickets. We simply cannot accept that true fans are being cheated in this way.'

MySpace likes iLike

MySpace has snapped up top Facebook music application iLike for $20 million (£12.1 million).

The service, which allows people to recommend music to other users, is the top-rated app of its type on Facebook on Bebo.

Owen van Natta, chief executive officer of MySpace, commented: 'iLike is an important part of a lot of different social networks' experience.

'We're delighted to continue extending that. We expect social networks will be thrilled that we're making iLike an even richer experience.'

News Corp-owned MySpace's purchase of the app comes after Facebook bought social networking site news aggregator FriendFeed last week.

More than four-fifths of iLike's total traffic comes from Facebook.

Twitter study reveals 'pointless babble'

A study of the micro-blogging site Twitter has found 40 per cent of the messages sent are 'pointless babble'.

Pear Analytics, who undertook the research, found 40 per cent of people used Twitter for 'pointless babble', nearly 38 per cent used it for 'conversational' tweets, and only 8.7 per cent of tweets were for 'Pass-Along Value'.

The study, which looked into why people used the site, found people were more likely to re-Tweet at 11:30am, particularly on Mondays. Self-promotion and spam made up 5.85 per cent and 3.75 per cent of Tweets.

The study concluded that: 'With the new face of Twitter, it will be interesting to see if they take a heavier role in news, or continue to be a source for people to share their current activities that have little to do with everyone else. We will be conducting this same study every quarter to identify other trends in usage.'

Ryan Kelly, founder of Pear Analytics, said on his blog: 'Some felt it was their source of news and articles, others felt it was just a bunch of self-promotion with very few folks actually paying attention. But mostly, many people still perceive Twitter as just mindless babble of people telling you what they are doing minute-by-minute; as if you care they are eating a sandwich at the moment.'

The study, conducted in America, also discovered conversational tweets were high between 14:00 and 16:00 in the afternoon, and heaviest on Tuesdays.

Researchers concluded: 'Most people are busy on Monday catching up with work, so perhaps it takes until Tuesday to get into the swing of Twittering again'.

Judge bans Microsoft Word, reports say

A judge has ordered Microsoft to stop selling Word in its current form, reports say.

The judge in Texas gave Microsoft 60 days to comply with an injunction, which forbids the company from selling Word products that let people create custom XML documents.

The ruling is related to a patent infringement suit filed by i4i.

Last year the company was fined a record £68.9 million after being accused of continuing to abuse its dominant market position.

The latest ruling, by Judge Leonard Davis, will also order Microsoft to pay an additional $40 million (£24 million) for 'willful infringement', as well as a $37 million (£22 million) in prejudgment interest.

A Microsoft statement said that they were planning to appeal the verdict.