The European Commission, fresh from a major court victory over Microsoft, launched new antitrust investigations into the software giant on Monday, on suspicion it abused its market dominance. Investigators will see whether Microsoft broke competition rules to help its Web browser and its Office and Outlook products, after complaints from Norwegian Web browser company Opera and a coalition of technology firms including IBM, Nokia Corp., Sun Microsystems Inc., RealNetworks Inc. and Oracle Corp. The European Commission opened two formal probes. The first one - triggered by a complaint from Norway's Opera Software ASA - will look at whether Microsoft illegally gives away its Internet Explorer browser for free with Windows. Opera had called on the EU to strip Internet Explorer out of Windows or carry alternative browsers. The second investigation will examine whether Microsoft withheld information from companies that wanted to make products compatible with its software - including Office word processing, spreadsheet and office management tools, some server products and Microsoft's push into the Internet under the name of the .NET framework. Microsoft said it would cooperate fully: "We are committed to ensuring that Microsoft is in full compliance with European law and court obligations," it said in a statement.

N64 fans will remember GoldEye as being an instant classic, and many gamers have been calling for Nintendo or Microsoft to release it on the Virtual Console and Xbox Live Arcade respectively, which had always seemed unlikely. However, Rare has recently revealed that the game was within two months of being released on Xbox Live. According to the game's original developer, the port had been in development for several months, and would be identical to the original other than that it would feature an online multiplayer mode and several characters would have to be removed due to licensing issues. Unfortunately, just as it was nearing completion, Microsoft and Nintendo couldn't agree on the financial side of things - apparently whether Nintendo would receive a one-off payment or a cut of the revenues.

Just three days after releasing it to approximately 15,00 beta testers, Microsoft has made the Vista SP1 RC Refresh publicly available. It can be downloaded here, but any previous versions of the service pack must be removed before installing this one. For details of the changes included with Vista SP1, visit this site.

Rumours are flying around the internet that Microsoft could be planning a takeover bid for computer peripherals firm Logitech. Apparently Microsoft will offer 48 francs per share, compared to the current value of 39.46 francs, giving Logitech a value of around 10 billion francs (or roughly $9 billion US). Amid this speculation, share prices have risen over 12% from 34.80 francs on Wednesday to their current value, although many analysts are still sceptical of any takeover, with Michael Foeth from Vontobel bank saying:

Today's share price rise is probably more related to a rebound in the market than any rumours.

On January 9th Microsoft made availble the latest pre-release build of SP1 - 'Windows Vista SP1 RC Refresh' - to approximately 15,000 beta testers. This group includes corporate customers, consumer enthusiasts, software and hardware vendors, and others. The code is not available for public download.

We are still on schedule to deliver SP1 RTM in Q1 CY08. The final release date is based on quality, so we will continue to track customer and partner feedback from the beta program before setting a final date.

Microsoft published the Microsoft Security Bulletin Summary for January 2008 which includes only two patches. The first one rated critical, fixes an issue with the Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) processing on Windows 2000, XP, Vista and Server 2003. The second one, rated important resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS). The vulnerability could allow an attacker to run arbitrary code with elevated privileges. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of an affected system and then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights.

DOWNLOAD: MS08-001 - Critical | MS08-002 - Important

According to Albert Penello, group marketing manager for Xbox hardware, the Xbox 360 console could be equipped with a Blu-ray add-on in the future if HD DVD fails to take off. Penello said:

It should be consumer choice, and if that's the way they vote, that's something we'll have to consider. I fundamentally don't think this has a significant impact on Xbox 360 versus PS3. You can't say it's not a bummer, not a setback, but I've seen this battle declared over so many times. I want consumers to have a voice in this and I think there are a lot of consumers who bought HD DVD who are going to have a say in how this shakes out.

Despite rumors to the contrary, Microsoft did not unveil an Xbox console with HD DVD capabilities built-in at CES, and has no plans to do so in the future, according to an executive in Microsoft's entertainment business. "Absolutely not," said Jeff Bell, corporate vice president of global marketing for interactive entertainment at Microsoft, when asked Monday if an HD DVD Xbox was in the works. Microsoft has been pushing HD DVD over Blu-ray as the format for high-definition video, but HD DVD suffered a significant setback last week when Warner Bros. said it would drop support for the format in favor of Blu-ray. Monday during an interview at CES in Las Vegas, Bell said Microsoft is taking a more agnostic view on how to serve up HD video. He said that it's up to consumers to make a choice between the two formats, not vendors. "We'll let the market decide how they're most interested in consuming entertainment," he said.

Microsoft Corp. and telecommunications leader BT announced they are bringing together the next-generation TV service BT Vision with Microsoft's Xbox 360 games and entertainment system. All BT broadband customers will have the unique opportunity to receive the best in high-definition gaming, television and movies through an Xbox 360 console, in a powerful, all-in-one entertainment experience. BT Vision, which is powered by the Microsoft Mediaroom Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) platform, plans to make this first-of-its-kind device and service offering available to customers in the middle of 2008. The announcement was made during the keynote address by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates and Microsoft President Robbie Bach of the Entertainment & Devices Division at 2008 International CES on Jan. 6.

Microsoft and Broadcom Corporation today announced a collaboration in Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) products. The collaboration includes Microsoft and Broadcom working together to enable the popular Microsoft Mediaroom IPTV client software to operate on next-generation set-top boxes (STBs) utilizing the Broadcom BCM7405 system on a chip (SOC). This technology will permit service providers and original equipment manufacturers to support a range of features such as whole-home digital video recording (DVR), high-performance user interfaces, and photo and music sharing.

Members who paid for Gold accounts may receive compensations for the holidays Xbox LIVE downtime. While nothing has been officially announced, a Microsoft rep said "...we will definitely be doing something for our Gold members that weren't able to get online over the last week." Microsoft still hasn't completely resolved the issue, but company's Larry Hryb reassured that "As people have noticed, we have made good progress. We have a bit more work to do, but we're doing much better now. I know some of you still may be having issues, and we're working on those."

Microsoft's chairman Bill Gates is set to make an "important announcement" regarding the Xbox 360 at next week's CES show in Las Vegas, reports The Seattle Times. The paper doesn't say exactly what Gates' revelation will regard at the electronic show, but it does go on to speculate that it might be the reveal of yet another Xbox 360 SKU with built-in HD-DVD playback. "In particular, Microsoft could work with Toshiba to develop a digital video recorder with a hard-drive, high-definition HD-DVD drive and Xbox gaming capabilities." says Seattle Times columnist Brier Dudley. "Microsoft could also make a splash by announcing plans to give the Xbox 360 an internal HD-DVD drive, putting it on par with Sony's PlayStation 3 that has a built-in Blu-ray drive." he also added. Built-in HD-DVD playback is the logical next step for the 360, but let's wait until next week and see what happens then.

Microsoft recently launched the beta version of the new Microsoft Download Center website that intends to be more convenient and easier to navigate than the current version. The new website is powered by SilverLight technology which is Microsoft's anti-creation of Adobe Flash. You must have the SilverLight plugin for Firefox or Internet Explorer in order to view this new beta site. From now on when you enter the Download Center you'll be asked to try the new SilverLight Beta Center.

It appears Microsoft has contracted the Saratoga, California firm, Gyration to develop a motion-sensitive add-on for the existing Xbox 360 controller. It is no accident that Gyration is the company responsible for the prototype designs of the Nintendo Wii-mote, which we all know has become a huge success. Most recently, the company was in the spotlight for creating a motion-sensing remote for Microsoft's Media Center. There're no details on when exactly the new motion-sensing Xbox 360 controller will see light. The company denied the rumour saying that "Microsoft does not comment on rumors or speculation" and that there's "nothing further to share." at least for now.

Microsoft Corp. will change how users activate Windows XP when Service Pack 3 launches in the first half of 2008, a company white paper said. New installations of Windows XP SP3 will give users the same 30-day grace period currently offered to Windows Vista customers before they're required to enter a product activation key, the 25-character code that proves the copy is legitimate. "As in Windows Server 2003 SP2 and Windows Vista, users can now complete operating system installation without providing a product key during a full, integrated installation of Windows XP SP3," the Microsoft paper stated. "The operating system will prompt the user for a product key later as part of Genuine Advantage." With earlier editions of Windows XP, users must enter the activation key during the installation process itself; failing to do so, or using an invalid key, would result in the installation being blocked. The white paper, however, noted that the change does not apply to existing Windows XP installations upgraded to SP3. Those copies, which have presumably passed the activation stage previously, will not request the key again, Microsoft said.

Microsoft has warned Windows Home Server users not to edit files stored on their backup systems with several of its programs, including Vista Photo Gallery and Office's OneNote and Outlook, as well as files generated by popular finance software such as Quicken and QuickBooks. "When you use certain programs to edit files on a home computer that uses Windows Home Server, the files may become corrupted when you save them to the home server," Microsoft said in a support document posted last week. The document went on to list the software, which includes Windows Vista Photo Gallery, Windows Live Photo Gallery, OneNote 2003, OneNote 2007, Outlook 2007, Microsoft Money 2007 and SyncToy 2.0 Beta. Others programs, however, may also corrupt files stored on a home server powered by Microsoft's operating system. "Additionally, there have been customer reports of issues with Torrent applications, with Intuit Quicken and with QuickBooks program files," the document said. "Until an update for Windows Home Server is available, we recommend that [you] do not use the programs that are listed to save or to edit program-specific files that are stored on a Windows Home Server-based system."

Just in time for Christmas, Microsoft has unveiled the option for Xbox Live users to gift Microsoft Points, the currency used to purchase downloadable games and in-game content from the Xbox Live Marketplace as well as music from the Zune Marketplace. Currently in a beta state, the program, which also allows users to buy points for themselves, is accessible from this website. At present, the initiative is limited to people in the United States and gift-givers must know the Windows Live ID of the intended recipient, though Xbox Live director of programming Larry Hryb noted that the team is looking to add the option to gift by Gamertag in the future.

In time for the holidays, Microsoft is giving shoppers even more value by reducing the price of its incredibly popular Xbox 360 Wireless Racing Wheel by $30 to just $99 (U.S. ERP). The newly priced Xbox 360 Wireless Racing Wheel now comes bundled with a driver disc and a demo of the acclaimed "Forza Motorsport 2" including full force feedback support. The Wireless Racing Wheel is compatible with all of the most popular racing games on Xbox 360, including: Forza Motorsport 2, Project Gotham Racing 3/4, Test Drive Unlimited, Need for Speed Carbon, DiRT and Nascar 08.

Microsoft has revealed that it is planning to release the initial beta of Internet Explorer 8 in the first half of next year. According to the developers, the new browser has passed the Acid2 Browser Test from the Web Standards Project, a test which both IE 7 and Firefox fail (although Opera passes). Microsoft is also focusing on making sure that IE 8 displays all current web pages correctly, an issue which plagued IE 7 during the first few months after its release. In his IE blog, one of Microsoft's general managers, Dean Hachamovitch, said the following:

The key goal is interoperability. As a developer, I'd prefer to not have to write the same site multiple times for different browsers. Standards are a (critical!) means to this end, and we focus on the standards that will help actual, real-world interoperability the most. As a consumer and a developer, I expect stuff to just work, and I also expect backwards compatibility. When I get a new version of my current browser, I expect all the sites that worked before will still work.

Microsoft has given no indication of when it expects to release the final version of IE 8, instead commenting that its launch date will depend upon the feedback received during the beta process.

Technology giants Microsoft, Google and Yahoo! have agree to pay $31.5 million to settle claims that they promoted illegal gambling. However, none of the companies contested or admitted that they were guilty of such an offence, which accused them of running adverts for illegal gambling websites between 1997 and June this year. The $31.5m breaks down into $21m from Microsoft, $3m from Google and $7.5m from Yahoo!. Some of the money from the three companies will be used towards funding for the International Center for Missing and Exploited Children, public service advertising and adverts warning young people about illegal gambling. Google gave the following announcement:

While we did not admit any wrongdoing, the Department of Justice has advised that online gambling is illegal in the United States and ads to promote it are improper. Google voluntarily discontinued running such ads, which were a very small part of our AdWords business, in April 2004.

Microsoft is to implement a random number generator in Windows Vista Service Pack 1 which has a known flaw, described by security researchers as a 'back door'. The weakness could, at worst, allow an unknown attacker to decrypt EFS-protected data and SSL sessions such as used for internet banking and World of Warcraft logons. It's not all doom and gloom, however: the flawed RNG will be bundled with a second, more reliable version which will be selected by default. It does make you wonder why Microsoft have bothered implementing the flawed version, known as Dual_EC_DRBG, at all. The algorithm, approved by the American National Institute of Standards and Technology (which, for you paranoiacs out there, works closely with the No Such Agency), is based on elliptic-curve mathematics and uses a set of constants to 'seed' the generation. It has been determined by security researchers Dan Shumow and Niels Ferguson that these constants have a special relationship to a second, secret set of numbers. In theory, anyone who has the second set can determine what 'random' number the algorithm will pop out at any given time. Which has cryptologists such as Bruce Schneier suitably worried. By default Vista SP1 will use the CTR_DBG algorithm (based on the Advanced Encryption Standard) which is thought to be more secure than the possibly-backdoored Dual_EC_DRBG. As a result, a developer would actually have to make a concious effort to use the possibly-insecure algorithm and thus put the security of encrypted data at risk. Still, it's a disquieting thought that the heart of any system designed to offer users privacy could have such a major flaw and still get shipped to end-users.

A few years ago, one of the biggest weapons in a Mac user's arsenal for any Windows vs OS X debate was that Apple's operating system was more secure than Microsoft's. However, the statistics compiled by ZDNet (which are shown in the table below) tell a very different story for this year. Combined, Windows XP and Vista saw a total of 44 flaws, whilst Max OS X experienced 243 - over five times more. Overall, Macs had 234 highly critical vulnerabilities compared to just 23 for Windows, although admittedly Mac OS X had no extremely critical flaws, whilst Windows had four. This would seem to suggest that the tables have turned a little, which could well be linked to the fact that Macs have become more popular over the last couple of years and as a result there is a greater incentive to hack them.

Viacom Inc. and Microsoft Corp. today announced a broad-based, strategic alliance under which major divisions of both companies will collaborate on advertising, content distribution, event promotions and games over the next several years.

Microsoft Corp. recently delivered a surprise for customers and partners, unveiling a public beta for its hypervisor-based server virtualization technology called Hyper-V, a feature with some versions of Windows Server 2008. Customers and partners today can download Windows Server 2008 RC1 Enterprise with the beta version of Hyper-V to evaluate the new technology, test applications and plan future consolidation, business continuity and high-availability projects.

Microsoft Corp. today announced the release of the Xbox 360 HD DVD Emulator, enabling film studios and disc authoring companies to model the behavior of HD DVD disc content, including encoded video and HDi interactivity, in a virtual environment before committing to burning a single HD DVD disc. This comprehensive tool is among the first commercially available, software-based solutions of its kind, eliminating the need for expensive hardware or time-consuming and costly trial-and-error processes for testing HD DVD titles, helping to ensure that titles ship error-free.