CIO-Connect CEO to leave in December
After 12 months as CEO of blue chip user group CIO-Connect,
Margaret Smith, formerly IT director and board member of Legal
& General, leaves at the end of December. Smith said she was
leaving to allow the National Computing Centre (which owns
CIO-Connect) to achieve its longer-term objectives for the
operation within its group. Raza Hussain, managing director of the
Impact Programme, takes over on a temporary basis.
Fire and Rescue to adopt Airwave
Fire and Rescue services will be the third of the emergency
services to adopt the Airwave digital radio communications network.
Firelink, which procured the national communications contract, said
O2 Airwave won the bid to equip all Fire and Rescue services
throughout England with a resilient and secure voice and data
service.
Group to focus on strong authentication
The Liberty Alliance Project, a consortium of companies working
on federated identity management standards, has created a group to
focus on developing open specifications for interoperable "strong
authentication". Strong authentication is based on a user name or
password, a hardware token device and biometric information such as
fingerprints.
SME IT budgets set to grow, says IDC
Thirty per cent of small and medium sized businesses in Europe
plan to increase their IT budgets over the coming months, research
by IDC reveals. Companies in the finance and retail sectors are
leading the drive to increase spending, with public sector
organisations planning more modest increases. IDC predicts much of
the increased spending will go on mobile solutions.
VoIP insecurity no barrier to adoption
Forty three per cent of IT directors consider VoIP technology to
be inherently insecure, but do not see this as a barrier to
adoption, according to new research commissioned by business
communications provider Viatel. Of the 100 IT directors surveyed,
66% said they believed VoIP was robust enough to carry voice, a
figure that rose to 80% of respondents in the financial services
sector.
Councils running shared services to save
£140m
Councils can make annual savings of £140m by joining forces to
run shared services, a new Audit Commission report has found. High
staff turnover, old IT systems, backlogs and the use of temporary
staff were identified as high cost factors. The savings that could
be achieved far exceed the target of £75m a year over three years
set by the government.
OINto share legally safe Linux-based
technology
Major IT suppliers have formed a new company to share legally
safe Linux-based technologies. IBM, Sony, Philips, Red Hat and
Novell have formed the Open Invention Network (OIN). The company
aims to protect developers and users from legal action as a result
of using patented technology. Until now, many users have been wary
about using Linux for fear that its open source development could
have relied on other companies' patented technology without their
permission, leaving them vulnerable to legal action.
Cisco and Microsoft join forces on VoIP
Microsoft and Cisco Systems have joined forces to make it easier
for firms to adopt voice over IP systems. They are working to
integrate the Interactive Connectivity Establishment protocol into
Microsoft software. This will help VoIP communications on corporate
networks to get through network address translators, which can stop
VoIP systems from working correctly.
Met Police CIO gets deeper in to strategy
Director of information at the Metropolitan Police Service,
Ailsa Beaton, has been elected head of the Association of Chief
Police Officers (Acpo) information management business area (IMBA).
The appointment will involve developing a national policing
information strategy.
Barclays appoints UBS' Freeborn as new CIO
Barclays Capital, the investment banking division of Barclays
Bank, has appointed Philip Freeborn as its new managing director
and CIO, responsible for the firm's technology function globally.
Freeborn has been at UBS for the past 12 years in technology roles,
with responsibility for several thousand global IT professionals.
He will join Barclays Capital in January 2006.