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Thousands of Hotmail passwords have been hacked and posted online, BBC News has learnt.

Microsoft, which owns the popular web-based e-mail system, said that it was aware of the claims and that it was "investigating the situation".

BBC News has seen a list of more than 10,000 accounts, which technology blog Neowin.net said had been posted online.

The blog suggested the accounts had been hacked or had been collected as part of a phishing scheme.

Phishing involves using fake websites to lure people into revealing personal details such as bank accounts or login names and passwords.

"At the moment we don’t know how the hackers got the passwords or how many they got," Graham Cluley, consultant at security firm Sophos, told BBC News.

Read more on newsbbc.com

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Prime Minister Raila Odinga has called for the accelerated development of green energy technologies.

While chairing the 19th session of the National Economic Social Council meeting at the Kenyatta International Conference Centre, Odinga said climate change is currently a major threat to realizing the growth envisaged in the Vision 2030.

The Prime Minister said green energy development could improve energy security in the country which could lower energy costs while at the same time reducing the bill incurred on imported petroleum products.

Odinga said for Kenya’s economic blueprint, the Vision 2030 to succeed, measures ought to be put in place to mitigate the impact of climate change while increasing the capacity for adaptability.

Read more on kbc.co.ke

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(CNN) — Google Wave, a product that promises to revolutionize online communication, will go out to about 100,000 beta testers Wednesday.

Google Wave hopes to replace e-mail as the main way people communicate online.

The Web application from Google Inc. combines elements of e-mail, chat, Wiki documents, blogs and photo-sharing sites to create a form of Internet communication called a "hosted conversation," or a "wave."

Google demonstrated Wave at the Google I/O developer conference in San Francisco, California, in May. The closed group of beta testers will help Google fish bugs out of the application before a public release by the end of the year, according to the Google Wave Web site.

The app was created by Jens and Lars Rasmussen, the Australian brothers who developed Google Maps. The Rasmussen brothers said they hope Google Wave will eventually replace e-mail as the main way people converse on the Internet.

"This should be something everybody uses and something everybody knows," Jens Rasmussen said.

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Co-founder Evan Williams said in a blog post that the site had secured money from five investment firms.

However, he did not confirm earlier reports that suggested the firm had managed to secure $100 million (£62m), which would value the firm at $1bn.

The site, which allows users to write and share 140-character messages, has more than 45 million users worldwide.

The site had previously raised $35m in February in a deal that valued the business then at $255m.

"It was important to us that we find investment partners who share our vision for building a company of enduring value," wrote Mr Williams.

"Twitter’s journey has just begun."

Industry watchers have pointed out that the firm still has no way of making money.

However, earlier this month the site revised its terms and conditions to allow advertising on its service.

Read more on news.bbc.co.uk

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RIYADH – Boasting one of the fastest supercomputers in the world, a team of top scientists and a campus where female and male students can mingle freely, Saudi Arabia’s new multi-billion dollar university aims to break both scientific and social barriers.

Officially the goal of this week’s launch of the sprawling new facility is to propel the kingdom into the heady global ranks of technological research.

But with women on campus not having to wear the black abaya and allowed to drive cars.

On Wednesday the monarch, in a keystone of his attempts to power his country into the 21st century, will open the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology — KAUST — probably the only postgraduate research university ever built from scratch.

Both the ambition and the billions of dollars thrown at the project have sparked deep interest in the global science community.

In just three years the Saudis have constructed a high-tech campus of huge modernist buildings on a 36-square-kilometre (14-square-mile) desert plot on the Red Sea coast, and recruited hundreds of scientists and students from around the world.

KAUST has already launched joint research programmes with institutions ranging from the National University of Singapore to France’s Institut Francais du Petrole to Britain’s Cambridge and Stanford in the United States.

And it has created its own research operations spanning nanotechnology, applied mathematics, solar energy, membrane research and bioengineering.

"Two years ago it was nothing but sand and sea. Today there is one of the best infrastructures for research," KAUST president Choon Fong Shih said.

Read more on middle-east-online.com

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Mobile providers have said that US proposals to ensure all traffic on the internet is treated equally should not be applied to wireless traffic.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) wants rules to prevent providers blocking or slowing down bandwidth-heavy usage such as streaming video.

Providers claim a two-tiered system is essential for the future vitality of the net.

Mobile operators said any regulation would damage innovation.

FCC chairman Julius Genachowski said doing nothing was not an option.

In his first major speech since his appointment earlier in the summer, he told an audience in Washington that the rules were "not about government regulation of the internet".

"History’s lesson is clear. Ensuring a robust and open internet is the best thing we can do to promote investment and innovation," he told the audience at Washington think tank the Brookings Institution.

"And while there are some who see every policy decision as either pro-business or pro-consumer, I reject that approach; it’s not the right way to see technology’s role in America."

Read more on newsbbc.co.uk

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(CNN) — Three-dimensional images are expected jump out of movie theaters and into living rooms by next year.

Panasonic demonstrates 3-D television at a recent technology expo in Atlanta, Georgia.

Sony and Panasonic say they will release home 3-D television systems in 2010; Mitsubishi and JVC are reported to be working on similar products.

"TV finally becomes real" in three dimensions, said Robert Perry, an executive vice president at Panasonic. "You’re in it. It’s the next frontier."

Perry compared the 3-D transition to the switch from black-and-white to color television and the shift from standard- to high-definition images. See what 3-D TV demos look like »

ESPN is test-recording some sporting events in 3-D, using cameras with two sets of lenses, which would make football players appear to jump out of home television screens during live 3-D broadcasts.

And, although television makers haven’t released specifics, the price of 3-D TV — which requires a new television, broadcasting content and 3-D glasses — is not expected to be substantially higher than some high-definition televisions on the market now.

Read more on cnn.com

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SAN FRANCISCO–At some point during the TechCrunch50 conference it became evident that the Web 2.0 floodgates are no longer open.

Maybe it was when conference co-organizer Jason Calacanis asked one of the panels of judges what they’d thought of a round of pitches from just-launched social-networking start-ups like inbox aggregator Threadsy and photo-sharing iPhone app Clixtr. Sean Parker, the Napster co-founder and former Facebook exec who will be portrayed as a "Silicon Valley bad boy" in the film adaptation of Ben Mezrich’s dot-com scandal tome "The Accidental Billionaires," leaned his elbows on the onstage table, slouched, and declared, "I’m a little bit bored with social media."

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There is more to Finland than Nokia. That is the message Finland is trying to send out to India — a market it is trying in earnest to explore, apart from that of China — and hopes to harness India’s talent pool, and more importantly, its manpower resources, to strengthen bilateral trade between the two countries that today stands at a modest euro 700 million. This, however, does not include the Nokia figures. Several small initiatives later, a very high-level delegation at the joint secretary levels will meet on October 8 and 9 to discuss a whole host of industrial sectors in which the two countries could share business interests. There are two more opportunities lined up to take further negotiations — the Science and Technology Summit in November, and the Delhi Sustainable Development Summit next February.

Read more on wn.com

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(CNN) — Forget Hollywood special effects or Impressionist paintings — some of the most stunning images are created by the mysterious and often violent forces in the universe.

Witness the handful of new snapshots taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, which was equipped with a new imaging camera during a space shuttle servicing mission in May.

It’s back in business and there’s lots to ooh and aah over.

"Let there be no doubt, this is truly Hubble’s new beginning," said Ed Weiler, NASA’s associate administrator, during a news conference Wednesday.

Take the image on the left of planetary nebula NGC 6302, also known as the Bug Nebula or the Butterfly Nebula.

Its "wings" are made of gas heated to more than 36,000 degrees Fahrenheit and there is a dying star at its center.

"The gas is tearing across space at more than 600,000 miles an hour — fast enough to travel from Earth to the moon in 24 minutes," NASA’s Web site says.

The "butterfly" is more than 2 light-years across.

Read More on CNN.com

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