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Rogers Communications Inc to introduce international data roaming plan in Europe for $10 a day

National Post Tech Desk - Fri, 04/10/2015 - 13:49

Rogers customers can soon use their cell phones when they travel across the pond without incurring hefty roaming or overage charges.

Beginning April 15, the Toronto-based wireless carrier will extend the international data roaming service “Roam Like Home” to over 35 countries in Europe, offering unlimited usage to people who are signed up to its “Share Everything” plan for a flat fee of $10 per day to a maximum of $100 a month. Calls and texts to local numbers in those countries – plus those placed home to Canada – are also included in the price tag.

Rogers introduced a similar plan in the U.S. last November for $5 per day, amassing more than one million users who tend to consume more data abroad than they do regularly at home, per chief executive officer Guy Laurence. He says clients are now using the Internet five times as much when they’re in the U.S. than they did when Rogers didn’t “Roam Like Home.” “We have broken the fear of roaming once and for all,” Laurence told a group of reporters Friday.

“You want to take a picture of the Eiffel Tower and you want to send it to your friend saying, ‘Wish you were here,'” he said. “You don’t want to worry about whether you bought the right data package.”

According to its website, Rogers currently offers travel roaming packs for people heading to Europe, with options starting at $9.99 per day for 20 MB of data.

How Apple Watch’s retail experience could turn off Apple Inc fans

National Post Tech Desk - Fri, 04/10/2015 - 12:33

Apple Watch debuted at stores across Canada on Friday, but unlike the launch of previous Apple Inc. products, the process of getting your hands on the expensive new device is significantly different this time.

Each customer is required to sign up for an Apple salesperson-facilitated tour of Apple Watch either through an online sign-up system or in-store. According to Apple, the experience is very different from browsing the aisles of your local Best Buy, Wal-Mart, or even walking into the Apple Store and purchasing a MacBook or other Apple product.

Since the Apple Watch and smartwatches are generally untested technology, (and despite the common belief they’re destined to be the next big thing in tech), the Cupertino, California-based company has taken a controlled, hands-on approach to convincing customers the Apple Watch is essential to their lives.

Patrick O'Rourke/National PostThe Apple Store's initial testing station.

From a consumer perspective, the Apple Watch is one of the most confusing products the company has ever released. For example, prices range from $450 to $17,000 depending on the model and strap, and only two Canadian Apple Stores are set to carry the ultra-high-end version of the Apple Watch. The key to this sales pitch is convincing consumers the Apple Watch is more than just a silly gadget and instead is a life-simplifying, highly-customizable, fashion statement.

Customers can’t even walk out of the store with an Apple Watch, at least not yet (a leaked memo from Apple retail chief Angela Ahrendts indicates orders will remain online only). Today is only the start of pre-orders for the device and some versions of the smartwatch have already sold out or been pushed back to a June shipping date. The official release of the Apple Watch in Canada is on April 24.

Those without one-on-one product tour appointments, but who are still interested in checking out the Apple Watch, will be able to view a large glass display case showing off various watch models. Customers will not be able to drop-in and expect to go hands-on with the Apple Watch – a fact which confused many eager browsers at the Eaton’s Centre Apple Store today.

Patrick O'Rourke/National PostThe Apple Watch's in-store display case shows of the device's various versions and strap combinations.

The tour begins at a station with stand-mounted watches featuring the 42mm Apple Watch and not the slightly smaller 38mm version. Surprisingly the 42mm Apple Watch doesn’t look too big on most people, even for those with small wrists. Customers are able to run through picture messages, test the device’s unique “force touch” feature, its Digital Crown, and also switch between Apple Watch’s various other apps, giving the tester a feel for how the product operates.

Next, customers move to another table where the salesperson opens a drawer full of an overwhelming number of choices including: Apple Watch Sport (the least expensive $450 Apple Watch with a rubber strap) and the stainless steel Apple Watch models. This section of Apple’s in-store demo unfortunately isn’t interactive and is very similar to the stand-mounted portion of the tour, but it does allow the wearer to get a feel for what the Apple Watch will look like on their wrist, as well as test its various straps – one of the device’s key selling points.

Straps will likely become an unexpected deciding factor setting the Apple Watch apart from other similar devices such as the Pebble, Moto 360, Samsung Gear S and LG G Watch. Unlike other devices, the Apple Watch’s proprietary bands have been designed by Apple and feel significantly different from a standard watch straps, or even bands included with already released smartwatches.

Patrick O'Rourke/National PostThe fancy drawer where that shows off the various versions and strap combinations of the Apple Watch.

For instance, the $199 Milanese Loop strap, as well as the $199 Leather Loop strap are made of magnetized material designed to mould to the shape of the wearer’s wrist in an intuitive way. Even the Apple Watch’s $69.99 rubber sport band has a surprisingly slippery feel to it, preventing the strap from sticking to skin. The $329 buckle strap and and $599 adjustable Link Bracelet (which is more expensive than some Apple Watch models) are less impressive, although the Link Bracelet’s ability to remove individual sections on the fly is interesting.

However, every strap, whether you’re purchasing the Sport or Apple Watch edition of the device, comes at an additional cost. The only strap included with the Apple Watch’s two base models is the rubber Sport Band.

Over the course of the tour, similar to a high-end jewellery store, the Apple Watch customer service representative discussed the various pros and cons surrounding each version of the Apple Watch and its bands, and also helps the customer put on and take off each model of the watch.

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Whether or not Apple’s gamble on the smartwatches pays off remains to be seen, but it’s obvious from the company’s approach to retail that it intends to market the Apple Watch as more than just a gadget, and instead as a high-end, expensive fashion statement. However, the company’s attentive approach to retail could turn off potential buyers who might prefer browsing the device and discover its features on their own.

Inside the Amiibo hunter’s mind: Two Canadian collectors share their thoughts on Nintendo’s super scarce toys

National Post Tech Desk - Fri, 04/10/2015 - 09:08

Nintendo may be struggling to sell consoles and games, but it’s having no trouble at all moving Amiibo.

The collectible plastic figurines, which retail for about $14 each and can interact with Wii U and Nintendo 3DS games via near-field communication (NFC), have become a terrific success story for the Japanese game maker, with more than 3.5 million sold as of March 12, less than three months after their introduction in mid-November.

In fact, they may be selling a little too well.

Supply of many of the 30 or so Amiibo released to date in three separate “waves” has radically failed to meet consumer demand. Some figures, many of which may never see another manufacturing run, are simply no longer available at retail outlets and can now only be found online, sold by opportunistic resellers for a premium – sometimes upwards of $100.

NintendoA special golden Mario Amiibo was released in North America on April 10th.

The craze reached such a fervor earlier this month that online pre-orders at major merchants such as Toys R Us and Gamestop for the fourth wave of Amiibo – set to land in May – sold out in minutes. Overeager buyers actually brought down Gamestop’s website for several hours on April 2nd when pre-orders came available, prompting the game seller to rethink how it pre-sells the collectible toy.

Armchair observers have offered plenty of opinions about Nintendo’s Amiibo strategy, suggesting the manufacturer brought too many different Amiibo to market too quickly, and that it ought to set up new production runs for unavailable figures to satisfy fans who’ve gone empty handed rather than simply march ahead with the launch of new figures.

(Post Arcade asked Nintendo for comment regarding ongoing Amiibo supply and demand issues, but received no reply.)

But regardless of the game giant’s handling of the situation, there’s no denying the passion felt by Amiibo collectors. Zen Rankin is one of them. The 34-year-old owner of an Ajax, Ont.-based creative services company has been a lifelong Nintendo fan and early adopter of most of the company’s products.

Zen RankinCollector Zen Rankin proudly displays his complete Amiibo set on a shelf in his home.

“I decided to have them all from the very start,” said Rankin of Nintendo’s collectible figurines. Indeed, he’s one of the few who have managed to track down every last one made available to date.

“People thought I was crazy to order all 12 original figures from day one, but my loyalty paid off.”

Rankin has continued to plan ahead for each subsequent wave. He set himself up to receive Google alerts about Amiibo news and is friendly with people who work at EB Games who let him know when new figures are coming available at their stores. He’s even waited out in the cold to ensure he’s among the first to place an order for the latest figures.

“My goal is not to pay premiums to scalpers on eBay, but I suppose I am paying a premium with my time,” he mused.

The only figure he had trouble tracking down so far is Meta Knight, the mysterious masked rival of Nintendo’s iconic Kirby, which was made available exclusively at Best Buy.

“We can blame Best Buy’s online ordering policies and poor customer service for that,” he said. “That was the only figure I paid more than the store price for online. I have been very lucky so far.”

Guelph, Ont.’s Micah Shearer-Kudel, a 24-year-old Nintendo fan who works on environmental projects for an agricultural organization, has also managed to collect all Amiibo released to date. His strategy involves Amiibo Facebook groups, frequent visits to classified ad website Kijiji, and working with like-minded friends to either pre-order new Amiibo or purchase them at launch.

Like Rankin, Shearer-Kudel is determined not to pay more than the manufacturer’s suggested retail price for his figures.

“I have not yet paid more than $13.99 for an Amiibo,” he said proudly. “I don’t plan to pay more, either. I don’t want to support scalping if I can avoid it.”

He did, however, have to make a sacrifice to get one particularly scarce figure.

“I had a lot of trouble finding a Rosalina Amiibo,” he admitted, referring to one of the few female Amiibo currently available. The blond haired, tiara-wearing Amiibo was slated as a Target exclusive, but when the retailer announced it was shutting down its Canadian stores its supply went to shops like EB Games, Toys R Us, and Best Buy.

“Normally, more places selling Amiibo would be a good thing,” explained Shearer-Kudel. “In this case, the stock was stretched incredibly thin. Preorders sold out in minutes at every location. Stores received only one or two each in some cases. I traded a rare Amiibo of my own, Shulk, to obtain Rosalina.”

Micah Shearer-KudelMicah Shearer-Kudel keeps his Amiibo -- including this group of rare specimens -- in-box.

But while avid collectors like Rankin and Shearer-Kudel are clearly willing to put in the time and money to purchase hard-to-find figures, their commitment relies on Nintendo maintaining their goodwill. If it begins to seem as though the game maker is purposefully nursing the Amiibo bubble or simply doesn’t care whether keen collectors can find the figures they want, both indicated they might stop their fervid quests to track them all down.

“Originally, I thought external factors such as the sinking loonie, west coast port strike, and other issues were to blame for lack of supply, but with the latest wave set to launch stock is still dismally low,” said Shearer-Kudel when asked why he thought there was such a wide gap between Amiibo supply and demand. “I think it’s a combination of Nintendo appealing to their shareholders by keeping demand high and folks looking to make some easy money by purchasing figures and reselling them.”

Rankin has experienced moments of frustration, too.

“Some days have been more trying than others,” he admitted. “If something is much too expensive, difficult, or time-consuming to obtain I usually give up collecting that particular thing. I personally find the store exclusive Amiibo to be annoying to collect. Exclusive Amiibo figures only seem to benefit the retailers.”

As a collector I’ve learned that if I’m interested in something specific and it’s difficult to find it will only make me want it more

That said, there’s no denying the increased desire often instilled in collectors when a product is in short supply.

“As a collector I’ve learned that if I’m interested in something specific and it’s difficult to find it will only make me want it more,” said Rankin. “Sometimes it becomes a bit of a real-life meta-game to collect them.”

“I definitely crave the rarer Amiibo more,” Shearer-Kudel agreed. “Like my other special items, they are on full display.”

However, he’s also considered selling off his collection, which is mint and in-box.

“I have fought with the decision to keep collecting or sell or trade what I have currently,” he said. “I think I want to keep collecting because when I can look at a complete set I think it will be a testament to the time and effort I have put into it.”

Rankin hasn’t considered selling his collection, but he admits there’s a limit to the amount of effort he’s willing to put into the hunt.

“If Nintendo makes it more difficult to obtain certain figures I will give up on collecting them all.

“I need to be realistic.”

Netflix Inc upgraded to buy at Citi

National Post Tech Desk - Fri, 04/10/2015 - 06:25

Netflix Inc. was upgraded to buy from neutral at Citi Research ahead of the Internet television company’s first-quarter earnings on April 15.

Analyst Mark May also raised his price target on the stock to US$525 from US$409, noting that its recent pullback provides a buying opportunity.

One reason is because competition concerns look overdone. May believes investors are paying reasonable multiples for more established markets such as North America and the U.K., but next to nothing for international markets that make up a total broadband household opportunity of 350 million.

The analyst also noted that Netflix’s content lineup has improved in 2015 and newer releases are getting good reviews, which bodes well for subscriber growth.

“Numerous data points continue to support how disruptive Netflix is to video viewing habits and to the broader media landscape,” May said in a report.

“To be clear, this is not a call on the quarter; we recognize that a beat or miss of one hundred thousand domestic subscribers can cause Netflix shares to be quite volatile around earnings, and we have found no data point that we can use to predict the subscriber number with such precision,” he added.

“Over a 12-month horizon we believe shares are poised to outperform as growth in international markets becomes more fully appreciated and as Netflix’s original content lineup drives sustainable subscriber growth in the U.S.”

Apple Watch pre-orders begin, luxury US$17K gold model sells out in China under an hour

National Post Tech Desk - Fri, 04/10/2015 - 05:32

PARIS/SYDNEY — Consumers flocked to Apple Inc’s stores in Canada and around the world on Friday to get the first close-up look at the tech giant’s smartwatch, which the company expects will be its next runaway hit.

The Apple Watch, CEO Tim Cook’s first new major product and the company’s first foray into the personal luxury goods market, was available for pre-order online and to try out in stores — but not to take home.

On April 24, consumers will be able to buy it online or by appointment in shops including trendy fashion boutiques in Paris, London and Tokyo, part of Apple’s strategy of positioning the wearable computer as a must-have accessory.

Testing Apple’s mastery of consumer trends, the watch is an untried concept for the California-based company. It straddles a technology market accustomed to rapid obsolescence and luxury goods whose appeal lies in their enduring value.

The Apple Watch sport starts at US$349 while the standard version comes in at US$549 in the U.S. High-end “Edition” watches with 18-karat gold alloys are priced from US$10,000 and go as high as US$17,000.

China was among countries where the watch had its global debut Friday, reflecting the country’s fast-growing status as one of Apple’s most important markets.

According to a Business Insider report, the “Edition” watch has already sold out in the country, with the pricey gold model going out of stock in under an hour.

Lam Yik Fei/Getty ImagesApple Watch smartwatches displayed at an Apple Store in Central on April 10, 2015 in Hong Kong.

In central Shanghai, potential Apple watch buyers stood in lines two to five people long over their lunch hour at an Apple store on Friday to try on the watch many said they already planned to buy.

“It was beautifully made, like an expensive watch,” said Li Hao, 27, a Web designer who owns a Mac, an iPad and an Apple TV. He has just traded up from an iPhone 4 to the new iPhone 6 Plus.

Li said he planned to buy the sport version of the watch at about 3,000 yuan ($500).

“I cannot do sports with the mobile phone,” he said. “I need a machine to record what I did and a screen to look at.”

Qi Tian, 26, who works in human resources for a real estate company, said he was “not a big fan” of Apple, though he owns four or five products. He said he planned to order a watch online that day.

“I just came to see if the size fits,” said Qi.

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Before the Paris Apple store opened, about 100 people were queuing outside. Staff cheered and applauded the first customers, most of them men aged under 30.

I have everything from Apple so now I need to get the watch

“I have everything from Apple so now I need to get the watch,” said 19-year-old Jeremy Dugue, who was sporting an Armani leather jacket.

Within the first hour in Paris, many customers had pre-ordered their watch, and several went for the entry-level model with a black plastic bracelet. High demand means some shoppers in Paris will have to wait 4-6 weeks before their watch arrives.

“It was comfortable, I didn’t think it would be that comfortable. It’s an easy way of managing your busy life,” said 19-year old student Omar Alborno, one of the first to try on the watch at London’s luxury Selfridges department store.

MIXED REVIEWS

Earlier on Friday, Apple’s flagship store in Sydney’s financial district was packed with those hoping to get the first peek at the device, although just around 20 die-hard fans queued out front, modest by the standards of a major Apple launch.

Based on recent customer interest at its stores, Apple expects demand for the watch, which allows users to check email, listen to music and make phone calls when paired with an iPhone, to exceed availability at launch.

Reviewers this week praised the watch, which also helps users monitor their health and exercise, as “beautiful” and “stylish” but gave it poor marks for relatively low battery life and slow-loading apps.

Sales estimates for 2015 vary widely. Piper Jaffray predicts 8 million units and Global Securities Research forecasts 40 million. By comparison, Apple sold nearly 200 million iPhones last year.

Apple’s watch is widely expected to outsell those by Samsung, Sony Corp and Fitbit, that have attracted modest interest from consumers. It will likely account for 55% of global smartwatch shipments this year, according to Societe Generale.

“Apple will outsell its wearable rivals by a very wide margin but it will do this on the power of its brand and its design alone,” independent technology analyst Richard Windsor said.

“Consequently, I am sticking to my 20 million forecast for the first 12 months and see the potential for some sogginess in the stock as reality sets in.”

© Thomson Reuters 2015, with files from Associated Press

Google Inc’s Android for Work partners up to crack the enterprise market

National Post Tech Desk - Fri, 04/10/2015 - 05:00

As BYOD becomes more entrenched in the enterprise, the Android operating system becomes more of a challenge. Android devices are often the phone or tablet of choice for consumers, and they’re bringing those choices into the office.

Google’s February launch of Android for Work showed businesses that Google was finally taking their needs seriously. “We want to make Android great for the enterprise,” said Rajen Sheth, director of product management, Android and Chrome for Work.

Until now, he acknowledged, there was no way to say “yes” to Android in the enterprise. But Google couldn’t go it alone – it had to look to its partners.

“The strength of Android is the people building on it,” said Mr. Sheth. “Devices don’t matter unless people can do great things with them. Partnerships bring enterprise apps to Android.”

With Android for Work, added Nicholas Barretta, Android sales engineer at Google, the company is making Android a first-class citizen in the enterprise.

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Now it is upping the ante a bit more. The just-released Android 5.1 (Lollipop MR1) update adds a number of business-friendly features such as support for using more than one cellular carrier SIM card at a time. This feature lets users activate and use additional SIMs on devices that have two or more SIM card slots. It also includes support for telecommunication service providers to create apps that can perform carrier provisioning tasks on an Android device, providing a secure and flexible way for carrier-developed apps to perform these tasks and to be distributed through Google Play.

Or, through Play for Work, which allows admins to define company-approved apps that are offered to designated groups of employees. This gives the flexibility to offer apps to specific departments or work groups without presenting them to the entire organization.

Partners and developers can also build functionality into their apps that allows them to be pushed to user devices by management software.

Google has inserted hooks to allow Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) software to interface with apps in Play for Work. Upgrades are automatically approved, Mr. Barretta said, cutting down on IT’s workload. If permissions for an app change, however, it will have to be re-authorized by IT, to ensure nothing untoward is sneaked through. If admins choose, they can pre-configure approved apps, for example, adding an email tagline or setting a browser’s home page.

However, despite the new features, getting acceptance in the enterprise is still an uphill struggle, Mr. Sheth noted. “It’s a perception thing, as opposed to reality,” he said. “We need to educate businesses on all the things not only that we do, but that our partners do with security to make Android a great platform. As we have been able to sit down with CIOs and CSOs within corporations, they’re pretty well convinced when they look at what we do in terms of security.”

“We want to get to the point where CIOs don’t have much to think about,” he went on. “We’ve integrated [Android for Work] with the most widely used management platforms in the industry. As they look at these technologies, hopefully it will be easy for them to say ‘yes’ to Android.”

Waterloo-based instant messaging service Kik says it’s ‘exploring partnerships,’ not just a sale

National Post Tech Desk - Thu, 04/09/2015 - 14:27

Last year Waterloo-based Kik Interactive Inc. published a blog post outlining the company’s future goals, and none of them involved an acquisition.

In the post, entitled “Independence,” the company’s founder Ted Livingston wrote, “we are choosing not to sell.” But on Thursday, according to an interview with Bloomberg, it seems Livingston has changed his stance on the issue to some extent. In the interview, Livingston says Kik has hired Qatalyst Partners, a Silicon Valley-based company known for brokering large tech takeover deals, in order to gain a better understanding of what a major investment or partnership from a corporate partner could look like for Kik.

“Chat is an incredibly hot space right now, and we’ve been getting a lot of approaches for acquisitions for quite a while. However, we kept on getting approached and finally decided we should at least consider all the options. So now we’re talking to pretty much every company to see what a partnership might look like. We hired Qatalyst, who we’ve known for years, to help us do that, but we remain committed to building Kik as an independent company,” said Livingston in a statement to the Financial Post.

Qatalyst recently opened a new strategic division focused on helping companies reach partnerships, rather than find potential buyers.

Kik is one of many popular mobile-focused instant messaging platforms that utilize Google Inc.’s Android operating system and Apple Inc.’s iOS platform. The messaging application currently has more than 200 million registered users in 230 countries around the world and allows people to exchange texts, photos and video messages instantly over a WiFi or mobile data connection via a smartphone.

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The instant messaging app market is becoming increasingly crowded, with similar applications such as Facebook Messenger, Snapchat Inc., KakaoTalk, Tencent’s WeChat and WhatsApp Inc. – which Facebook Inc. purchased last year in a US$19 billion deal – all vying for users’ attention. Following Facebook’s February 2014 acquisition of WhatsApp, the company’s shares slid 3.4 per cent, but then recovered by the end of the day.

The recent furor surrounding Kik working with Qatalyst has led to industry speculation that a variety of suitors have already approached the company regarding a potential acquisition. However, in his interview with Bloomberg, Livingston denies Kik is set on an acquisition, instead emphasizing his company is only exploring its options.

“To be clear, we are absolutely committed to staying independent,” Livingston told Bloomberg.

Kik has reportedly raised US$70 million in venture capital funds and still has two years worth of financing left. The service also has ambitions of becoming a Facebook Messenger-like platform, potentially offering users additional features beyond instant messaging. In a recent interview with the Financial Post, Livingston discussed his far-fetched ambition to build Kik into “the third great network,” after television, internet and telephones. Last November, Kik raised US$38.3 million in funding and also purchased Toronto-based Relay, an instant messaging start-up that incorporated animated content such as GIFs into its service.

During Facebook’s F8 conference, Facebook revealed plans to open its Messenger platform to third-party developers, allowing the creation of tools able to alter what the service is capable of, giving users’ the ability to display store receipts and share GIFs.

Facebook has taken its other messaging service, WhatsApp, in a different direction and recently introduced the ability to make voice calls on the platform. WhatsApp currently has 700 million registered users.

Temporary image and video sharing platform, Snapchat, was recently valued at US$15 billion following a recent investment from Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. The image sharing platform reportedly rejected a US$3 billion takeover offer from Facebook last year, opting to remain independent.

Bell Media’s Kevin Crull stepping down as president effective immediately

National Post Tech Desk - Thu, 04/09/2015 - 13:44

MONTREAL — BCE Inc. says Kevin Crull is leaving his position as president of Bell Media, CTV’s parent company, effective immediately.

Crull apologized publicly in late March for intruding on the editorial integrity of the broadcaster’s news team during its coverage of a decision by the CRTC requiring broadcasters to offer low-cost packages to cable subscribers.

In his apology, Crull said he was wrong to try to influence the editorial decisions of CTV journalists and says he had apologized to the team directly.
It followed a report in the Globe and Mail that Crull had demanded that journalists not give any airtime to CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais.

Bell Canada president and CEO George Cope said in a statement announcing the departure that Crull had been a significant part of Bell’s strategic transformation.

However, he added that the independence of Bell Media’s news operations is of paramount importance to the company and to Canadians.

“The independence of Bell Media’s news operations is of paramount importance to our company and to all Canadians. There can be no doubt that Bell will always uphold the journalistic standards that have made CTV the most trusted brand in Canadian news,” said Mr. Cope in the statement.

More to come…

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With files from Financial Post staff

Rogers Communications sees sharp drop in customer info requests from police and security agencies

National Post Tech Desk - Thu, 04/09/2015 - 10:52

Rogers Communications Inc. received 113,655 requests for information about its customers from government and law enforcement agencies in 2014, a 35 per cent plunge from the previous calendar year.

According to its second annual “Transparency Report” published Thursday, the Toronto-based company attributed the drop in the number of requests to tighter internal policies that were instituted last summer in response to customer feedback and what it called the “critical” Supreme Court decision of R. v. Spencer.

The court ruled that Canadians have a reasonable expectation of privacy on the Internet. As a result, police have to obtain a court-ordered search warrant and present it to service providers to access information that would identify the name and address associated with a specific Internet Protocol address.

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Rogers made two changes to how it handles data requests: Previously, Rogers said it would confirm “basic” customer information such as name and address so police didn’t issue a warrant for the wrong person or business. It also had a “special process” in place to assist sexual exploitation investigations, where the company would confirm a person’s name and address when provided with an I.P. address. But since June, in the wake of the landmark court ruling, Rogers has started responding to these types of requests only when it is presented with a court order, warrant or in an emergency, a switch it claims balances its desire to “protect” its clients’ privacy and “allow enforcement agencies to continue safeguarding the public.”

Rogers received 29,438 customer name and address checks in 2014, a sizable decline from the 87,856 requests submitted a year earlier. Of the seven categories for which it records, the company saw a small uptick only in the amount of emergency requests from police, which rose from 9,339 to 10,016.

“It is important for our customers to know that we only provide their information when required by law or in emergencies, after we have carefully reviewed the request,” Ken Engelhart, the company’s chief privacy officer, said in a letter accompanying the report. “If we consider an order to be too broad, we push back and, if necessary, go to court to oppose the request.”

Rogers said it refused or provided no data 2,278 times last year. This figure includes a large request, which would have involved over 30,000 customers, that Rogers deemed to be “too broad” to fulfill.

A response in the “Frequently Asked Questions” section says federal, provincial and municipal bodies have contacted Rogers to see personal customer information. The list includes Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Canada Revenue Agency, and Canadian Security Intelligence Service, as well as police forces and coroners.

The Criminal Code, the federal privacy law for companies known as PIPEDA, and rules set out by Canada’s telecommunications regulator govern how private client data is collected, stored and shared.

The report states that Rogers does not provide “direct access” to its customer base. It stores information only “for as long as it’s required for business purposes or as required by law.” It also notes that Rogers doesn’t keep “customers’ communications like text messages and email because our customers’ privacy is important and we don’t need to retain this information.”

How CIOs should prepare for a hackers’ bonanza when Windows Server 2003 retires

National Post Tech Desk - Thu, 04/09/2015 - 10:44

For IT professionals, this summer could potentially get very interesting. In just over three months, on July 14, 2015, all support will cease for Windows Server 2003. Microsoft will no longer produce patches or security updates for the venerable operating system.

For hackers, it’s a bonanza. It’s almost a given that they will have exploits in their pockets, waiting to be used for attacks once patching ceases. It’s worrisome enough that Public Safety Canada has issued an advisory, reminding users, “Organizations running software after its end of support date may be exposed to increased compliance and security risks. Hardware and software compatibility issues may also arise when implementing current technologies which may not have been designed for use with Windows Server 2003.”

Microsoft also notes that customers running Windows Server 2003 after its end of support will risk falling out of compliance with PCI data security standards, and thus be unable to work with major payment card providers such as Visa and MasterCard.

It’s potentially a huge problem; Microsoft says that Server 2003 makes up 40 per cent of its installed base in Canada – some 380,000 servers. It was one of the company’s most successful server releases but, as VP of marketing operations Jason Hermitage pointed out, twelve years is an eternity in the technology world. “Every CEO should ask their CIO, ‘Are we ready for the transition?’,” he said.

Changing server operating systems is not a trivial task, but it can be made less painful with good planning, said Shawn Myron, director of product, cloud solutions, at Telus. It’s a five step process; if you get the first four phases right, the migration itself should be straightforward.

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First, look at the workloads. What are they, and where are they running (and is the hardware fit to be upgraded, or does it need to be replaced)? Next, categorize them by complexity and their importance to the company. That gives input into the third phase: deciding where the workloads should be placed. Should they be on physical servers, virtual machines, or would a hybrid cloud be more appropriate?

Once those decisions are made, it’s time to build the migration plan. There may be dependencies to think about, such as necessary software version upgrades, hardware replacement, and staff training.

When all that has been nailed down, it’s time to do the actual migration.

In addition, Mr. Myron said, “Some organizations are thinking tactically. SQL Server 2005’s end of life is next year, so they are looking to see if there’s an opportunity to upgrade it now.”

Fortunately, companies don’t have to go it alone. Microsoft offers free tools to help with the migration planning and execution. The Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit (MAP) performs four functions key to any migration: discovery and inventory of computers and applications, hardware and software migration readiness assessments, software usage tracking, and capacity planning for virtualization, public and private cloud migration.

If a do-it-yourself approach isn’t in the cards, virtually every service provider offers some sort of program to assist customers in the move to a supported operating system (or to the cloud). With just over 100 days left to get the job done, that may be what it takes to stay secure, and to gain the added security and financial benefits provided by modern hardware and software.

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