Romania's hot PC market to pass $1B; notebook sales soar

By Drew Wilson
Courtesy of EE Times Europe

BERLIN — Mobile PCs are beginning to overtake desktop sales in Romania as the PC market continues strong double-digit growth, according to research firm IDC.

Romania's total PC market in 2007 was worth $828M, according to Diana Preda, systems and hardware analyst for IDC Romania. She expects 52 percent growth to $1.26B in 2008.

Small businesses and home users are driving overall PC demand, as well as more significant investments in education and government projects. Moreover, local online retail stores are boosting mail orders.

Notebook PC unit demand is up 128 percent year-on-year and shows no signs of abating, according to the research firm. Desktop shipments, however, have slowed sharply to single-digit growth rates.

"The point at which notebooks prevail on the market is getting closer," Preda said. "Except for the government sector and SoHo segment, demand from all other end users has clearly shifted in favor of notebooks."

eBay Hacker 'Vladuz' Arrested in Romania

By Ina Steiner
AuctionBytes.com

A cyber-criminal who embarrassed eBay for nearly a year with claims he had hacked the site was arrested on Thursday, according to eBay. "Vladuz" had harassed eBay with his taunting from December 2006 through October 2007, when he accessed eBay servers and gained limited access to a very small number of eBay accounts on the eBay.com site. (eBay said at the time that at no point did the fraudster get any access to financial information or other sensitive information.).

eBay called him a "known Romanian fraudster going by the handle Vladuz." He first began posting on discussion boards on eBay's German site in late 2006, and in February and March of 2007, Vladuz posted on eBay boards using the pink line reserved for eBay employees.

In September, eBay closed its Trust & Safety discussion board for hours after threads began appearing listing the names and addresses of eBay members.

And in October, some members who had been publicly critical of Vladuz claimed he had locked them out of eBay briefly and sent them an email to prove it.

Vladuz was a major topic of conversation among some eBay users, particularly regular posters to the Trust & Safety discussion boards hosted by the auction site. A few sellers actually considered Vladuz a sort of folk hero who exposed eBay's security weaknesses, and they posted videos to YouTube detailing the alleged activity.

eBay issued a press release Thursday evening to report the arrest, reading in part, "Despite numerous efforts to defraud eBay users via accessing administrative accounts, Vladuz was unsuccessful in his attempts." The company publicly thanked the Romanian General Directorate for Combating Organized Crime (DGCCOA), in cooperation with the United States Secret Service and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, "for successfully arresting cyber-criminal Vladuz, who had attempted to defraud eBay users."

According to some Romanian websites but as yet unconfirmed by AuctionBytes, the person eBay calls Vladuz who was arrested in Romania yesterday was a 20-year-old by the name of Vlad Duiculescu, or, Românul Vlad Constantin Duiculescu. One site, "Hotnews.ro," attributed local Romanian authorities as stating that Vladuz "is accused of illegally accessing email accounts of eBay users in 2005-2007." (http://tinyurl.com/4sx79g). The site also reported, "eBay representatives managed to contact Duiculescu undercover, pretending to be interested to purchase his application. eBay representatives agreed to purchase the kit and gave his real address which lead to his arrest." Other reports estimate the alleged perpetrator scammed victims out of 2 million euro using phishing techniques.

eBay spokesperson Nichola Sharpe said local Romanian law enforcement officials would have to confirm details, as they considered the case confidential until a conviction was made. Asked why eBay had issued a press release, Sharpe said eBay wanted to thank all of the law enforcement agencies involved who collaborated in the case. She also said that the community was aware of Vladuz, and said, "This is obviously great news."

Romania pushes for tech development in Western Balkans

Science Business Bulletin
Philip Hunt

The Romanian government is launching a campaign to make science and technology development a key to prosperity and peace in the strife-torn Western Balkans.

The programme, which kicks off 17 January at a Brussels conference, aims at attracting European Union and private investment to the region’s universities and technology industries.

“We live in a beautiful region with great potential,” says Anton Anton, President of the Romanian National Authority for Scientific Research. “And as we have benefited greatly from the EU pre-accession and training programmes, we feel it is our turn to help our neighbours. Because building peace in the region depends to a great extent on mutual cooperation, for a shared quality of life.”

Romania, like current EU president Slovenia, is a neighbour to the troubled countries in the Western Balkans: Albania, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. The state of technology development in the region – after nearly 20 years of conflict – is poor. For instance, in the period from 2004 to 2006, these countries were spending between 0.05 per cent (Bosnia) and 1.24 per cent (Croatia) of their gross domestic product on R&D, according to a report published by an EU-funded R&D-coordination programme, the Southeast European ERA.NET. By comparison, the EU average R&D intensity in 2006 was 1.86 per cent of GDP, according to the European Commission.

Mutual cooperation the way forward

Romanian officials see modernisation of the region’s scientific research and technology sector as the key to building modern high-tech industries and creating long-term employment.

For the science and technology sector, what should be the priorities? “At the moment, there is no free movement of researchers,” says Anton. “This should be first on the list of priorities. Because for Romanians the moment that we could travel as full EU research partners to meet with our colleagues abroad, to cooperate with them, that was the moment that research took off.”

As full EU members, Romanian scientists now enjoy full access to EU Framework research programmes such as FP7, while some Western Balkan countries have only limited access. “Access for Romanian scientists back in the days of FP5 and FP6 was also limited,” he says. “With such limited access you need a helping hand, and that is what Romania is trying to do.”

Attract young researchers into science and technology

The second priority, Anton feels, is to create networks that encourage young researchers. “Not just in pure science, but also in research development and innovation. Young people in these fields should work together from the very beginnings of their working lives. They are the leaders of the future, and through cooperation they will influence others.”

Strengthening the local and regional research base in the Western Balkans should be a related priority, he believes. If younger people are to be attracted into scientific and technological research, they need to have access to research environments of a significant size, and within an area where distances between centres are not too great.

When it comes down to agreeing priorities with his Western Balkan colleagues, he believes a certain amount of compromise will be necessary. A possible way forward, he says, is a project to construct a kind of database of assets, then to get the key people round a table to work out in which areas to cooperate, and decide which areas should be strengthened to become the lead centres for the region.

“This is going to be up for discussion,” he says, “but I think we need a sort of regional ESFRI , to develop maybe a local or medium-size infrastructure, a sort of satellite infrastructure that is strong enough to link to the larger ones.”

Organisational innovation also required

Anton believes that a certain amount of organisational innovation will also be necessary. “Take the position of research manager in SMEs. It is a new kind of managerial role, one that is not yet recognised in the Western Balkans. Yet it is one that should be helped to appear.”

“We cannot impose new organisational roles,” Anton continues, “but we can make them possible by helping SMEs to specialise in science management and consulting. The moment that we have good science managers – that is the moment that we can improve our position in competitive research.”

EBay goes far to fight fraud -- all the way to Romania

The country is the top source of organized scams on the auction site. The company has sent over equipment and a team to help the authorities there.

By Ian Wylie, Special to The Times
December 26, 2007

RAMNICU VALCEA, ROMANIA -- This small industrial center in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains is not Albena Spasova's favorite destination. Driving the twisting highway makes her ill. Once she arrives, danger lurks.

U.S. Secret Service agents escort her, for her safety. Over the last two years, they have kept watch on dozens of trips, some lasting weeks, others months, as she has spent long days foraging through case files with local police and long nights holed up in one of the town's few hotels, with her windows locked.

"You don't know who to trust there. You can't use the hotel phone line. When you step outside, you can spot the local hackers in their cars, circling around," said Spasova, 33. "The Secret Service agents always book my accommodation and make sure I'm in a room next to them."

Ramnicu Valcea is an improbable capital of anything, but this obscure town is a global center of Internet and credit card fraud. And Spasova is an accomplished online fraud buster, helping to take down cyber-crime gangs across Romania. She isn't an FBI agent, though, nor a Romanian police officer.

Spasova works for EBay Inc.

No one, it turns out, does Internet auction fraud like the Romanians. Bulgarians specialize in intellectual property theft; Ukraine is a leader in online credit card crime; the Russians have a profitable niche in Internet dating fraud.

But when it comes to online auctions, particularly for big-ticket items such as cars that can yield $5,000 a scam, Romanians own the game. Romanian police estimate that cyber-crime is now a multimillion-dollar national industry, as important to organized criminals here as drug smuggling or human trafficking.

The Internet Crime Complaint Center, a partnership between the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center, ranks Romania fifth in its table of naughty nations. But most experts agree that doesn't give Romanian criminals their due. Much of the cash being made on auction fraud reported as originating in the U.S., Canada, Britain, Spain or Italy is actually being picked up in those countries by Romanian money mules. An EBay fraud ring busted last year in Chicago, for example, has been traced to Pitesti, Romania.

EBay, which doesn't even operate a site in Romania, won't talk dollar figures but acknowledges that the country is the No. 1 source of "professional fraud." On a November 2006 visit to the Romanian capital, Bucharest, FBI Director Robert Mueller said the vast majority of Internet fraud committed on "one prominent U.S. online auction website is connected to Romania or Romanians."

That poses a problem for EBay. The San Jose-based auction giant has built its popularity and staked its reputation on self-policing feedback. Its system depends on buyers and sellers trusting one another -- to send money and to deliver the goods. Yet EBay users are the daily targets of phishing scams, spoof e-mails and fake listing attacks. Such schemes don't cost EBay any money. But some of its customers pay dearly. And they expect EBay to do something about it.

"The fraudsters need to know we're coming after them," said Rob Chesnut, Spasova's boss and a former federal prosecutor who set up EBay's Trust and Safety division. "EBay doesn't have a product. We are in the trust business: making people feel comfortable doing business with someone they don't know," he said. "If the bad guys have no fear of prosecution, they will continue to try to defraud users. So there has to be a cost to trying."

Computer experts

Romania is a grim place in more ways than one. Former pro-Nazi regime, then Soviet outpost, then weird Communist dictatorship and now developing nation: Per-capita income here is just one-third the European Union average. Fearing a flood of cheap labor, most European countries have barred or restricted Romanians from job hunting in their countries.

The country is dotted with shuttered factories, such as the Aerofina plant on the outskirts of Bucharest, opposite a potholed parking lot. This plant once built missile launchers and ejector seats for the Romanian air force's MiG-15s.

These days, though, there's something different going on here. Spread across the factory's dimly lighted third floor, 30 young Softwin computer programmers tap softly at their keyboards, tuning up the antivirus engines that power BitDefender, a software package starting at $25 that detects new computer viruses and releases programs to fight them.

In the last two years, BitDefender has been named a "Best Buy" by PC World magazine and garnered other kudos from Consumer Reports and the website TopTenReviews. IBM was impressed enough that it recently inked a deal to integrate BitDefender's anti-spyware and anti-virus smarts into its own virus prevention system.

Surprisingly, Romania has more than its fair share of homegrown computer security talent. Besides Softwin, the Bucharest firm GeCAD provided the technology for Microsoft's Windows Live OneCare anti-virus engine. Another half a dozen independent anti-virus companies, among them AxelSoft, Avira and Provision, are active in the capital; 11 more have been bought by foreign firms in the last four years.

Why here? "The respect for math is inside every family, even simple families, who are very proud to say their children are good at mathematics," said Radu Gologan, a senior research scientist at the Institute of Mathematics in downtown Bucharest.

And the country has years of experience with computers. In the 1980s, Romania was considered a Soviet satellite state, but dictator Nicolae Ceausescu hated bowing to the Russians. He refused to buy computers from Moscow, demanding that Romania build its own. While the Bulgarians built personal computers, Romania specialized in minicomputers such as the Felix C, based on Honeywell Bull's C11.

Florin Talpes, now a local entrepreneur, learned the art of reverse engineering at the Institute for Technology, Computing and Informatics.

"We would get hold of a minicomputer . . . and take it apart, reverse-engineering the operating system, the networking software, the hardware," Talpes said. "We developed a deep understanding, to the level of bits, of computing architecture, processing and software applications. We did it so that we could design a better operating system, better software, better hardware."

Forced to learn every bit of American silicon, every line of code, a generation of Romanians developed an aptitude for delving into the innards of machine code, using reverse engineering to deconstruct, anticipate and destroy viruses.

But if you're good at fixing the problems, you're also good at creating them. If you can stop viruses or Internet fraud, you're also in a position to make them happen.

'Second chance' scams

A classic Romanian scam is the "second chance auction." The mark: an EBay user who has narrowly lost an auction. The scammers can see that the user was prepared to spend, say, $145 on a particular item. They will then try to guess the user's e-mail address so that they can make contact off the EBay platform to offer a second chance to buy the item. Users commonly have the same e-mail address as their EBay user name, so the scammers may send out 50 e-mail messages using an EBay user name and the most common domain names such as Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo.

The Romanian scammers then cook up elaborate stories to persuade their victims to send money via unrecoverable methods such as Western Union -- even instructing people not to tell Western Union the payment is for an EBay transaction, claiming Western Union will charge them an EBay surcharge of 10% (it doesn't), and instead to say they're sending money to their Romanian cousin.

FBI Special Agent Gary Dickson, who works out of the U.S. Embassy in Bucharast helping EBay and other Internet companies chase down online auction and credit card fraudsters, says Romanian criminals are getting smarter.

"These gangs are very professional and take pains to avoid being detected," Dickson said. "They are highly organized and compartmentalized and use lots of middlemen. Everyone has a different job to do, and they communicate in different ways to avoid being intercepted. The whole operation is run just like a business."

A typical gang might have a "copy and paste" department, responsible purely for e-mailing pre-written scripts in reply to questions from EBay bidders. Some workers might create or buy phishing or escrow websites; another acquires fraudulent credit card details; others get fake IDs for couriers. The gang might hire a dozen students via online job boards, renting them an apartment where they do nothing but copy and paste e-mails. After maybe three months, this "factory" will disband as the gang moves elsewhere.

It's old-style fraud using high-tech tools. Romanian scammers are fond of using prepaid wireless modems that make it easier for them to avoid being traced. Some gangs also set up their own Internet service providers to escape or delay detection.

EBay's crime fighters

Spasova -- backed up by an EBay developer, analyst and data administrator -- began hunting down Romanian fraudsters for the online auctioneer in 2005. The first time she traveled to Ramnicu Valcea, she found just two law enforcement officers trying to clear a backlog of more than 200 EBay cases, armed with one 9-year-old computer and no Internet connection. To go online, the police had to use the same Internet cafes frequented by the fraudsters.

"There are a lot of scammers in Romania who believe they are untouchable, immune," EBay's Chesnut says. "They're sitting in their apartments in Ramnicu Valcea feeling like, 'There's no way EBay is going to get me.' "

But Spasova knew the situation wasn't hopeless -- if local authorities could get more training and technical help.

Spasova, Bulgarian by birth, was educated at a Bucharest university and worked for the American Bar Assn. after the fall of communism in the region, promoting law reform in Moldova and Bulgaria. By the end of the 1990s, she was helping the association train law enforcement officers, judges and prosecutors to counter money laundering and the emerging threat of cyber-crime.

"Even in 2001, I was meeting judges who thought cyber-crime was someone stealing a computer," she says.

To give the Romanian police a fighting chance, EBay has donated computers, digital cameras and Internet connections. In her first 12 months on the job, Spasova established relationships with law enforcement officers in 24 of Romania's 42 districts and with local ISPs.

After she had won their confidence, Spasova and her small team began working cases with local police, matching evidence with data from EBay's Fraud Investigation Team database, such as the Internet protocol addresses, which are unique to each computer, used when a fraudulent auction was posted -- the sort of information that could help police pinpoint the scammer

Orange Romania launches fixed line service and HSDPA

Telecompaper reports that Orange Romania has launched a fixed line telephony service targeting business and residential customers. The bundled DSL/voice telephony service is the third such offering from a mobile operator – Zapp and Vodafone Romania launched similar deals at the end of 2005 and earlier this year respectively. In related news, Orange also announced the launch of HSDPA services in some areas of the capital Bucharest.

Another SA contract in Romania

29 October 2007
Dex

The South African company Dex Security Solutions (DSS) has just signed another access control contract in Romania. The contract is with a huge fun and theme park in the city of Piatra Neamt in the Northeast of Romania.

As many as 25 000 people visit the park every day.

This not the first time that South African access control technology is implemented in Romania. Dex’s previous contract was for access control at the Stadionul Ceahlaul sport stadium in Piatra Neamt, the capital city of Neamt province.

Dex Security solutions provides the hard and software, and has trained a Romanian team to control and manage the process. Dex personnel from South Africa visit Romania on a regular basis, too.

The Head of Business Development at DSS, Darryl Davis, says Dex has already penetrated the West European market and established a number of sales representatives for its South African products. Dex also has a long-established office in Brazil, which takes care of its many projects in South America

Davis says it is gratifying to witness the great demand for South African technology all over the world.

Romanian EAS Market continues to be fueled

COMPUTER NEWS MIDDLE EAST - Sunday, October 28 2007

The enterprise application suite (EAS) market in Romania continues to grow strongly. According to a recent study from IDC, the Romanian EAS market is expected to expand by almost 21% in 2007, after recording 17.5% growth in 2006, when it reached nearly $53 million.

The main market drivers include robust economic growth, the inflow of foreign direct investment, effects of EU accession, and regulatory requirements, as well as growing awareness of the long-term benefits of investing in an EAS solution among businesses. “In 2006, pre-EU integration jitters did affect Romanian EAS spending, causing the market to grow slightly below expected levels, as companies preferred to redirect spending towards core business functions, compliance with EU norms, and business consolidation,” said Calin Mirea, Research Analyst, IDC Romania.

“The dynamic and highly fluctuating Romanian EAS environment shows that the market is just beginning to take off, with plenty of potential left unexplored, especially in the SMB segment.” In 2006, Enterprise Resource Management remained the largest functional area of the EAS market with 63.0% share, the only constant in an otherwise highly volatile functional market landscape. Supply Chain Management was second most in demand with 15.0% share, whereas operations and manufacturing modules represented 9.4% of the market.

In 2006, the Romanian EAS market was dominated by SAP, local vendor SIVECO, and Oracle. Their combined market share exceeded 64%, with the leader controlling more than a quarter of the market. On the demand side, the manufacturing industry was the top EAS spender in 2006, accounting for more than 36% of the market. Retail and utilities followed in terms of market share, but the fastest growing albeit relatively small segment was banking. IDC believes the Romanian EAS market will expand at an average annual rate of around 20% over the next five years.

PeopleSoft Technologies in Romania Brought by IT Six Global Services

Craiova, Romania, October 27, 2007 --(PR.com)-- In October 2007 IT Six Global Services has started the partnership for the development and maintenance of PeopleSoft products through a co-operation with an important American partner. The IT Six staff will deal with customizing the already existing applications as well as developing new modules that improve the performances of the products already implemented at the client’s headquarters. The installation, configuration and maintenance of the PeopleSoft applications are part of the range of offered services.

"From the early stages of the company, IT Six was involved in bringing in Romania technologies less popular in the country, but highly demanded worldwide. Today, we are one of the very few companies that offer Legacy Systems expertise (IBM Mainframes) and, more recently, PeopleSoft and Remote Infrastructure Management services. The PeopleSoft division offers both development services and remote administration of existing applications based on these technologies. We will continue to diversify our business lines in the future, also because it represents an attraction for all the programmers in Craiova and Cluj Napoca, thus ensuring our access to the best IT professionals on the market," said Sorin Gavanescu, the CEO of IT Six Global Services.

In the immediate future the company targets an intensive promotion of this division, IT Six being among the few companies in Eastern and Central Europe to have a dedicated PeopleSoft team.

About PeopleSoft
PeopleSoft is a complex system of integrated analytical operations designed for a better management of information and resources of a company, helping to fulfill all operational objectives. PeopleSoft is an efficient ERP tool, consisting in a wide range of modules to address each management aspect of a company: Human Resources, Accounting, Inventories, Invoicing, Salaries, Helpdesk, Sales etc. The application is widely known for the easy adaptability to many kinds of businesses, remaining, at the same time, generic enough to satisfy the corporation needs for audit control. PeopleSoft is part of Oracle Corporation and is supported by Oracle, but it can also be integrated with products of other global players such as Microsoft or IBM.

About IT Six Global Services
IT Six Global Services is one of the most dynamic companies in Romania which offers high quality software development services. IT Six is headquartered in Craiova and has a subsidiary in Cluj-Napoca. This places them in the low-cost zone of the world IT market but with a wealth of Information Technology knowledge.

IT Six is a private company whose main activity is the development of complex solutions and services for the IT&C market. IT Six is the Romanian subsidiary of KVG Consultants, INC., an American leading IT consultancy, based in Phoenix Arizona. KVG has been a market leader in Arizona for over 16 years, many of its clients being Fortune 500 companies.

The fact that all IT Six employees are fluent at least in English, together with a strict development and quality oriented methodology, have ensured their success on the global IT market competing against international companies, with many more years of outsourcing background. The year 2007 has brought an exponential growth of the company in terms of financial turnover, strategic certifications and partnerships – IT Six became Oracle Partner (next to Microsoft Certified Partner) and reaching a number of 100 employees.

Today, IT Six offers consultancy and software development services technology oriented, through the 10 internal technical departments: .Net, Java, Oracle, PeopleSoft, C/C++, PHP, IBM Mainframes, Action Script, Web design and QA/Testing.

Contact: Tusaliu Dan, Marketing Director, dan.tusaliu@itsix.com, +40741 970215

Romania tackles child porn with software

BUCHAREST, Oct 25 (Reuters) - Romania adopted a new computer system on Thursday to tackle Internet pornography, which officials fear may rise after the country joined the European Union this year.

They say growing labour migration and easier customs controls will likely encourage the exploitation of children in the southeastern European country, which the United Nations already considers a top source of human trafficking.

"The system was implemented today and we will start inserting facts in the database as soon as possible," Virgil Spiridon, head of Romanian police's cyber-crime unit, told reporters at a news conference.

He told Reuters: "We believe Romania will become a source of minors taken to other countries to produce child pornography."

Romania is the third country in Europe, after Italy and Britain, to implement the Microsoft CETS 2.0 system, which offers a database for information on suspect Web sites and potential perpetrators.

More than one in 10 Romanians has left the country to seek higher wages since the fall of communism in 1989. Many migrants leave their children behind in the care of relatives, neighbours or the state.

"With Romanian parents working abroad, leaving their children to be educated by their grandparents ... (the children) are very sensitive as potential targets for cyber-pornography," Vahe Torossian, Microsoft's president for central and eastern Europe, told Reuters.

About 1.2 million children are trafficked annually worldwide, and overall trafficking, including adults, is roughly a $10 billion-a-year-industry, the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children says.

Cosmote partners with Citibank Romania

Source: cbronline.com

Citibank Romania and Cosmote, a mobile operator, have announced that Cosmote customers can now pay their mobile phone bills using Citi's cash payment services, UniKasa and Easy Payments.

As a result of the alliance, all Cosmote subscribers, regardless of whether they are Citi clients or not, can now pay their invoices with cash in more than 50 Citi locations throughout the country.

For using UniKasa the payer has to show the invoice to the cashier. The cashier then scans the invoice's bar code, the payment is registered in the system and confirmed through a receipt and the payer pays in cash. The UniKasa system is free of charge for consumers. This service is available to anyone and the payer does not need to have a Citi personal account.

Easy payments, the automatic cash payment solution, was developed on the basis of a traditional ATM, whose function to withdraw cash was replaced by that of cash deposit. The operations can be made at any time of any day of the week, free of charge. Through easy payments, individuals can pay utilities, telecom, insurance policy bills, tuition fees, and traffic tickets/fines.

Cristela Georgescu, deputy general manager of Citibank Romania, said: "Citi is constantly looking for innovative ways to serve consumer needs and the Cosmote alliance is proof of our strategy to extend Citi's payment services and promote the 'payment center' concept while simplifying the end consumers' administrative activities."

Anca Ghimpeteanu, department manager of Cosmote Romania credit control, said: "We are pleased to launch yet another easy to use payment option for our subscribers by offering them the option of paying their bills in a rapid and safe manner through Citi's locations across the country."

Romania mobile penetration reaches 90.5% in June

The number of mobile subscribers in Romania rose to 19.5 million at the end of June, up 31.4 percent from a year earlier, according to figures from the local market regulator. Mobile penetration increased to 90.5 percent of the population versus 68.8 percent a year ago. There were 3.8 million postpaid subscribers using some 6.54 million SIM cards, showing a number of customers with more than one SIM. In the fixed-line market, the number of connections fell 7 percent from a year earlier to 4.106 million.

There were 72 active fixed-line providers, with alternative operators taking a 25 percent market share. Fixed penetration was at 19 lines for every 100 inhabitants. The number of internet subscribers rose 78.6 percent from a year ago to 4.5 million at the end of June, equal to 21 percent of all inhabitants. Of these, 2.2 million were broadband lines of at least 128 Kbps. The pay-TV market also showed strong growth, with the DTH market growing by 172 percent. DTH subscribers totalled almost 1 million at the end of June, while cable had 3.6 million users. The regulator will release a more detailed statistical report in November, including traffic figures.

Nest of Pirates

Transitions Online
Renate Zoeller
27 August 2007

Software piracy remains a concern in Europe. While the Romanian president jokes about it, Russia might finally get tough. Romania's information technology sector is said to be one of the most promising industries among the new European Union members. Foreign investors appreciate the high level of technical education combined with low wages.

Even Microsoft founder Bill Gates appeared to have an interest in the market when he visited Romania in February. President Traian Basescu took the opportunity to thank Gates, joking that pirated Microsoft software had helped Romania build a vibrant technology industry.

About 70 percent of software used in Romania is said to be pirated, but the country may be exceptional because its president actually acknowledges the practice.

“Mr. Basescu's remark is really annoying, but the problem is an international one,” said Jan Hlavac, spokesman for the Czech office of the Business Software Alliance (BSA), which supports software companies in their fight against copyright infringement. “Some countries have more bootlegs and some less, but all countries everywhere in the world have users of illegal software.”

Through campaigns and research studies, the alliance tries to make computer users and governments aware that illegal software copies are stolen goods and that the losses are immense for the information-technology sector.

A December 2005 study by the U.S. research firm IDC showed that a 10 percent reduction in software piracy in the EU could boost the IT industry's growth rate from the current 30 percent to 38 percent through 2009.

Because piracy also depresses demand for software design, customization and support, the study estimated that a 10-percent reduction could add about $400 billion to economies worldwide and $67 billion in tax revenues.

FLUID BORDERS

Today software producers operate in a weak legal environment, with little international coordination on intellectual property rights.

“Every country can decide for itself how strictly it wants to chase software piracy,” said Matthias Rumpf, a spokesman for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. “The only way to make them more sensitive to this problem is political pressure.

Copyrights are part of commercial law, so the EU could apply sanctions against countries where software piracy is tolerated, Rumpf said. But countries where piracy is commonplace – including Russia and Croatia – have yet to be punished this way.

The problem is compounded in these countries by laws that do not deal with computer hackers. The BSA ranks Russia second only to China in software piracy. Not surprisingly, then, in a market near Moscow's Bagrationovskaya metro station, shoppers can find music, films or software for absurdly low prices, sometimes before legitimate copies show up in shops.

Microsoft's new Windows Vista, which was to be more secure than the older Windows XP, was cracked by Russian hackers a few days after coming on to the market. It was quickly available on the black market in Russia, the Czech Republic, Poland and Croatia, according to the website www.markenpost.de. Microsoft invested $6 billion in Vista's development.

In January, just as Vista was being unveiled to consumers, Microsoft reported that more than 22 percent of all Microsoft installations are illegal, meaning that 512 million users worldwide in January were using the company’s software without a valid license.

The company considers these numbers to be conservative, as the program used to conduct the research can check only computers whose users give their consent.

CYBER SUPERPOWERS

The software industry seems helpless against piracy. “There's no way for us to control if someone is using pirated copies of our software,” said Matthias Gilke, spokesman for software maker Quark. “The only way to stop it is to prevent the sale of illegal software.”

Copy protection is of little help, because it only prevents the typical consumer from making copies. But since it is an easy barrier for hackers, it doesn’t make sense to invest too much in the technology, Gilke said. “We have copy protection on our software, but we prefer not to concentrate too much on it. It's impossible to stop illegal copies and more important to concentrate on the satisfaction of the clients that are willing to pay. We don’t want the high level of copy protection to interfere with the work flow of these legal clients,” he said.

There is almost no way to find illegal users. The police in the Czech Republic are well-educated about the problem Hlavac said, but they can still check a computer only when there is a well-founded suspicion that it is running illegal software. “We need evidence, no matter from whom. The common way is that someone reports to the police or to us that illegal software is used in a certain company. Usually former employees do so to take revenge. In that case the police will check the computers in this company and we have an angle to sue it,” he said.

Even when caught in the act, prosecution is difficult because often the informants are unwilling to testify in court.

SIZE MATTERS

Microsoft is so huge that it can survive piracy. But for small software producers the problem of piracy is more serious. The fast-growing markets are too important to pass up, but they are also risky, Gilke said.

“In countries like Russia we don’t have the right to sue someone if he uses our software illegally; there's no legal basis to punish hackers, Gilke said. “And in other countries it would be financially unrealistic to really chase every illegal user. We profit from the big lobbyists like Microsoft, which exert political pressure on countries where the copyright is not respected enough.”

Such pressure can have unexpected results. Russia, eager to join the World Trade Organization, has started to crack down on copyright infringement. Although it is still a high-piracy country, illegal use of software dropped by 4 percent from 2004 to 2005, according to a May 2006 study by the BSA and IDC.

In that context it seemed like a cautionary tale early this year when Russian authorities tried to prosecute Alexander Ponosov, a school principal from a small village in the Ural mountains. Ponosov had bought 12 new computers for his school that contained illegal copies of Microsoft software. He said he did not know the software was illegitimate.

The public was outraged, and Microsoft was quick to note that it had not requested that the teacher be prosecuted. Former Russian President Mikhail Gorbachev wrote an open letter asking for mercy for the principal. President Vladimir Putin called the case absurd. Leonid Reiman, Russia's IT minister, argued that the sellers, not the buyer, should be prosecuted.

Situations like Mr. Ponosov's arise often because buyers cannot afford to pay the full price for software, industry advocates acknowledge. The retail price for Vista is 300 euros.

Gilke suggests clemency for cash-starved start-up companies. “A quite common way to convince companies that use illegal software is to offer them amnesty [by saying], 'If you buy the legal update of our product and will pay for this, we will turn a blind eye to the fact that the basic version is an illegal one.' That means these companies might get the fully legal program even cheaper than it would be to buy it in the shop.”

Renate Zoeller is a freelance journalist based in Prague and Cologne.

Romania to computerize rural areas, small cities

Romania is to start a project aimed at computerizing the country's rural areas and small cities, Communications and Information Technology Minister Iuliu Winkler, said on Friday.

Under the project, known as the Knowledge-Based Economy, a electronic network will be set up covering 260 villages and towns with less than 30,000 residents.

It is expected to computerize 472 schools where some 125,000 pupils study, and offer Internet services to 1.74 million people, accounting for 17.7 percent of the total number of residents living in the country's rural areas and small cities.

It will cost 69.4 million U.S. dollars, 60 million of which will come from a 15-year World Bank loan and the rest will be paid with the government's budget.

Preparations for the project are nearing the end, said Winkler.

Source: Xinhua

Chinese company to undertake key IT project in Romania

A Chinese company has made a successful bid for a key IT project in Romania's Nokia Village worth about 200 million U.S. dollars, half of the total amount China has invested in Romania so far, local media reported Wednesday.

The Chinese company will manufacture PC cases, batteries, cameras, keyboards and mobile phone displays in the Nokia Village of Tetarom III Industrial Park, in central Cluj, said Cluj County Council Chairman Marius Nicoara, according to local daily Ziarul Financiar.

However Nicoara did not reveal the name of the company.

He said that he has contacted two other companies interested in investing and would negotiate with four more this September.

So far, 8,810 Chinese firms and companies are currently established in Romania, with an investment of some 400 million U.S. dollars in the process. China is the 16th largest foreign investor in Romania.

The Chinese company is also interested in another investment worth some 345 million U.S. dollars in Cluj County, but details of the investment will not be announced until September, Nicoara added.

The Nokia Village covers 90 hectares in the Tetarom III Industrial Park in Jucu village of Cluj County. The Nokia mobile phone maker received the government permit for its new Romanian factory and production is planned to start in 2008, the paper said.

Source: Xinhua

Romania unveils Israeli-made biometric device

Jerusalem Post

Romanian police will now enjoy a leg up from an Israeli-designed technology that will help them identify criminals. Last week, the Romanian minister of internal security and the Romanian police chief presided over the dedication ceremony of a new Israeli-produced biometric identification system. The system was developed by Motorola Israel and is supposed to be able to identify and break down fingerprints and palm prints.

Part of the appeal of the system is its ability to quickly search and find similarities with information in existing criminal files and databases.

The ADIS biometric system, which is known as the Printak Biometric Identification Solution, allows for the integration of a large variety of criminal information. Beyond print identification, it also can scan for facial identification and document and file locations, allowing police to more effectively organize existing investigative information.

"This system will serve Romania's investigative staff and the general police [the IGPR] in the war against crime. We expect it also to be used by the Interior Ministry, the National Office for Refugees, the Border Police, and the National Authority for Non-Citizens," said Ron Landenberg, the manager of Motorola Israel's Communications Systems for Export division.

Romania is not alone in acquiring Motorola Israel-made biometric technologies. Serbia, Cyprus and Greece have also purchased and operated similar systems.

In 2006, Motorola operated a similar system within the Miami Dade Police Department, and the police there reported that they solved seven cold homicide cases using the new biometric fingerprint system, which can also accommodate partial prints.

Israel and Romania have had increasingly close ties between their respective public security ministries. An agreement between the two countries to enhance cooperation in fighting crime and terrorism was signed earlier this year.

Romanians brighten Harry Potter game

By Justyna Pawlak

BUCHAREST (Reuters) - In the mobile phone version of the "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" video game, the torches hanging along the dark walls of Hogwarts glow in an eerily realistic fashion.

"We invented the technology, it's called 'dynamic lighting'," said Mihai Pohontu, general manager of Romania's mobile phone branch of Electronic Arts Inc, the world's biggest video game publisher.

Romanian programmers, such as Pohontu's team, are among the most sought-after in the world as large international IT companies turn to the east European country to take advantage of strong computing and language skills coupled with cheap labour.

Its computer literacy is not without its dark side -- the country has an unenviable reputation as a hotbed for computer fraud and a large community of hackers.

But legitimate IT is one of Romania's fastest growing export sectors with turnover of about 1 billion euros ($1.38 billion).

Roughly 90 percent of some 1,000 IT companies in Romania are foreign-owned and the government hopes exports will reach 1 billion euros in the next couple of years.

In February, Bill Gates opened a Microsoft Corp. technical support centre in Bucharest. The investment followed, among others, the launch of a development centre by Amazon.com Inc in the university town of Iasi in 2005.

That is the online retailer's only software development hub in Europe besides one in Scotland's Edinburgh. Other centres are located in India, the United States and South Africa.

"Romanian programmers are exceptionally creative. And in games, you need to explore," said Pohontu.

ALMOST TOO FAST

Prospects for large cash inflows from the European Union after Romania joined the bloc this January, cut-rate taxes and low wages add to Romania's appeal.

"In Eastern Europe, Romania is appreciated as having the biggest growth potential together with Turkey and Russia," said Stefan Cojanu, head of Oracle Corp in Romania.

The software maker, which has a support and software development centre in Romania, has doubled its local staff to 1,000 over the last year since opening a tower office in central Bucharest. It plans to hire an additional 500 employees.

"The geographical distance, the similar time zone and business mentality argue for us to develop our activities in a country where costs are also lower," Cojanu said.

Romania's low wages of around $600 a month compare with $1,050 in Poland and $950 in the Czech Republic. Both countries also attract hefty investment in the IT sector.

However, some see a risk the sector is overheating. Double-digit wage growth and a shortage of skilled labour is dampening the enthusiasm of some investors and Romania is struggling with emigration as workers leave for better pay.

"The battle for specialists is very intense," said Ana Ber, head of human resources firm Dr.Pendl & Dr.Piswanger.

"There aren't enough of them, especially as many emigrated."

Industry observers say this state of affairs has prompted companies to focus on building support or software development centres, which need cheaper and lower skilled labour, rather than hiring high-end programmers.

"Romania remains good for outsourcing but not for first-class software authors," said Dragos Stanescu, sales and marketing manager at GECAD, a Romanian company that sold RAV Antivirus technology to Microsoft in 2003.

"The brains are already with companies that have good salaries and it is costly to buy them. A good senior programmer can earn 2,000 euros gross a month. Plus a 30 percent raise to buy him, and you have a salary of a good programmer in Germany."

DARK SIDE

FBI data show Romania may be the biggest single source of online auction fraud in the world, a multi-million dollar industry that scams people using Web sites like eBay.

"It's highly organised. They create fake accounts to trick people into thinking they are insured," said Gary Dickson, FBI representative in Romania.

"If Romanians were stopped, the amount of online fraud would drop significantly."

Experts say some 70 percent of software used in Romania is pirated, and salesmen still visit office buildings in central Bucharest to sell pirated CDs and DVDs.

Some hackers hope their skills will help secure employment, although breaking into other people's networks for fame or as part of a job CV has its dangers.

"The Romanian hacking community is quite large. They see the computer as a ticket out of the country. It is the easiest way to get a better-paid job abroad," said Victor Faur.

He faces a potential 54-year jail term if convicted on charges of hacking into U.S. government computers, including NASA. He was indicted in 2006.

"I saw a computer for the first time when I was 14. And I was glued (to it)," said Faur, 23.

(Additional reporting by Iulia Rosca and Marius Zaharia)

Romanian Hacker Charged for Breaching NASA Computers, Disrupting Spacecraft Communication

Source: softpedia.com

A Romanian hacker was charged, after a joint operation of the Romanian police and the FBI, with hacking into NASA computers. The US space agency notified in July the Romanian police that its servers had been breached by unidentified people who accessed secure networks from computers based in Romania.

Victor Faur, 26, from Arad, was charged with breaking into NASA servers and even disrupting communication with spacecraft, which forced the agency to switch to manual communication and eventually rebuild its systems.

Faur was also accused of hacking computers belonging to the US navy and the Department of Energy between November 2005 and September 2006, according to an official statement. He was also previously indicted by the US Attorney's Office for allegedly being the leader of a hackers group called the "WhiteHat Team."

The group of hackers was famous for breaking into various computer systems precisely despite their reputation of being among the most secure in the world. It seems they weren't after all...

He graduated from the Faculty of Informatics in Arad, Romania and was selected to work for the IBM in the Czech Republic, where the company established its biggest center in central and southeastern Europe.

In television interviews, the hacker claimed his intentions were not destructive, as his actions only aimed at "proving that several computers are vulnerable to attack," and that they were not rewarded by any "material gains."

"I had neither modified nor erased the files, nor destroyed the communications systems," said Faur. He was denied the right to leave the country until the end of the investigation, which started in December.

Only last week, the US Department of Homeland Security admitted in a congressional panel that in fiscal 2005 and 2006, a number of 844 attacks on the lead US cybersecurity agency caused serious problems on its computer system, some leading to infection with viruses or other malicious applications.

Hackers around the world are known for breaking in some of the most secure computer networks just to prove that it can be done and often describe themselves as persons who enjoy exploring the advanced possibilities of programmable systems, searching for new ways to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users, who prefer to learn only the minimum necessary.

Romania Gets a Taste of LG Chocolate KU580

Source: softpedia.com

LG expands its line of mobile phones available on the Romanian market with the release of their KU580 model. The handset is part of the LG Chocolate line of handset models and is meant to respond to all high expectations coming from handset users.

Let us not forget that we are talking about a glossy handset, which means that appearance is what counts most of all. LG KU580 comes with a slim shape and the same features which have managed to bring success for its predecessor, the LG Chocolate phone model. It has the same smooth lines and touch sensitive keypads, although this time comes with a more bulky look. This takes away from its elegance and style, although this new model catches up when it comes to performances.

LG KU580 has to offer over the LG Chocolate model a 2 megapixel camera, when compared to the older 1.3 megapixel one. This is not a huge improvement, but just about the one needed to evolve from low quality to an average one.

This is an excellent mobile phone when it comes to media support. It has an integrated MP3 player which also supports 3D sound due to the Personal Music Composer function. Files can be easily transferred from the PC and on to the mobile phone through USB connectivity.

LG KU580 aims more at a range of teenage users, as the phone can also provide music video clips. The stylish design adds to this in an appealing way as well as the wide range of multimedia performances that it is capable of. The handset has proved to be highly appreciated in Europe, which gives it high chances of receiving the same consideration in Romania too.

LG KU580 will be available in all Vodafone shops in Romania starting this month. The price that the handset will be available on this market from now on has not been revealed yet.

Romania: Cernavoda 3 and 4 decisions forthcoming

The Cernavoda plant was originally intended to host five Canadian Candu pressurized heavy water reactors of 633 MWe each.

Saturday, June 30, 2007

by World Nuclear News

The Romanian nuclear industry expects Cernavoda 2 to begin commercial operation in July and government approval for the completion of units 3 and 4 within days.

Teodor Chirica, CEO of state generator Nuclearelectrica, said that Cernavoda 2 was in the final commissioning stage. After receiving permission from regulators, it had achieved 5% power and would progress to 100% and full commercial operation in July.

He also stated that before the end of June the Romanian government would approve the completion of units 3 and 4. Chirica was speaking at a London meeting, Nuclear New Build: The Role of the Private Sector, on 27 June.

The Cernavoda plant was originally intended to host five Canadian Candu pressurized heavy water reactors of 633 MWe each. Construction on units 2-5 has halted in 1991 in order to concentrate on unit 1, which entered commercial operation at the end of 1996. It now provides 10% of the country's electricity.

The government decided to resume work on unit 2 in 2000. After some upgrades during completion, unit 2 is rated at 655 MWe.

Negotiations to assemble a commercial consortium for the completion of units 3 and 4 are underway. It is expected that a project company would be formed and work begin in March 2008.

Chirica said the 64 month completion project would cost Eur2.2 billion ($3.0 billion), not including the cost of capital, but would result in two 720 MWe units with 30-40 year lives. He projected the cost of electricity generation by the units would be between Eur28.2-32.5 per MWh ($38.1-43.7).

The units would be constructed in parallel with a gap of "a couple of months" between each unit's start-up around 2014-5.

Betfair taps Romania for offshore software skills

"It's not stupidly cheap but it is cost effective"...

By Andy McCue

Published: Thursday 28 June 2007
silicon.com

Online betting and gaming company Betfair has set up an offshore software development centre in Romania to cope with the demands of its rapidly expanding product portfolio.

Betfair opened the 50-person facility earlier this year with just eight developers. Already it is up to 35 staff and the company expects the facility to be full by September. Although the cost of the staff is around 25 to 30 per cent cheaper than in London, Betfair said the main reason for setting up in Romania was to tap into extra skills and resources.

Eachan Fletcher, director of Betfair development in Romania, said there is so much work on the company's product roadmap that decisions were having to be made on what couldn't be done.

He told silicon.com: "We just didn't have the capacity to deliver all of it. It makes no sense to stick another 200 developers in London. We have almost reached a critical mass. You have to attract them away from city banks and it is costly and takes a long time."

Betfair looked at various countries including China, India and the Ukraine but opted for Romania because of the high-quality skills available, its relatively untapped potential as an offshore location and its recent EU membership.

Fletcher said: "It's virgin territory we were looking for. It's not stupidly cheap but it is cost-effective. We compared lots of locations. Many were cheaper but didn't have the quality versus investment you put in."

Betfair also decided to build and run the Romanian offshore facility itself rather than outsource it to a third party - and chose to locate it in the city of Cluj-Napoca.