The National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence at the National Institute of Standards and Technology Wednesday released a draft practice guide to help organizations recover from a cyber incident such as a ransomware attack, the center said in a Wednesday notice. It's seeking feedback on the draft -- called NIST Cybersecurity Practice Guide SP 1800-11, Data Integrity: Recovering from Ransomware and Other Destructive Events -- through Nov. 6.

Two Verizon cellular customers who filed a proposed putative class-action lawsuit against Turn for allegedly using "zombie cookies" to collect their personal data to deliver ads won a petition to have their case reheard when the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a lower-court ruling that tossed out the suit and compelled arbitration with the company. "We are pleased with the Ninth Circuit's decision and are looking forward to litigating these claims," said Lieff Cabraser partner Nimish Desai, who represent plaintiffs William Cintron and Anthony Henson. Ninth Circuit Judges William Fletcher and Richard Tallman and District of Arizona Judge Roslyn Silver issued the per curiam opinion (in Pacer) Tuesday that said the District Court for the Northern District of California "committed clear error by applying New York’s equitable estoppel doctrine, rather than California’s, and by failing to apply California law correctly." It was one of three of five factors from the 1977 case, Bauman v. U.S. District Court, that the panel said weighed in favor of granting the petition. According to the opinion, Verizon granted Turn, described as a "middle man," a license to target ads to subscribers in exchange for a cut of the revenue. Turn attached tracking cookies to Verizon subscribers' "Unique Identifier Headers" to collect data to its servers, but the carrier's customers "were allegedly unable to detect, delete, or block these 'zombie' cookies attached to the UIDHs," said the opinion. Plaintiffs filed the class action on behalf of Verizon subscribers in New York, saying Turn engaged in deceptive practices and interfered with "the use and enjoyment" of their devices, said the opinion. Turn sought to dismiss claims and force arbitration in the customer agreement between customers and Verizon for any disputes, but the panel said Turn isn't a signatory to the agreement and the district court didn't do a "choice-of-law analysis" when it granted Turn's motion to compel arbitration. Neither digital marketing company Amobee, which said in April it's acquiring Turn, nor Turn's attorneys commented. Verizon declined to comment.

Global shipments of headsets for virtual and augmented reality in Q2 increased 26 percent from a year earlier to 2.1 million units, IDC reported Tuesday. Volume sequentially declined slightly, “but recent price cuts on existing products and announced plans for new products are expected to lay the groundwork for a successful holiday season,” IDC said. VR market growth “has been rather sluggish,” showing the need for “end user education is extremely high,” the company said.

The operators of the YouTube-mp3 website, which converts audio from YouTube videos into MP3 files, will be permanently restrained and enjoined from operating the site or substantially similar sites, under a proposed final judgment and permanent injunction (in Pacer) filed Friday in docket 16-7210 in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. PMD Technologies, doing business as YouTube-mp3, was sued in 2016 by labels including Arista Records, Capitol Records, Warner Brothers Records and Sony Music Entertainment, claiming copyright violations. Under the settlement, defendants also would be permanently enjoined from operating any technology or service that allows such "streamripping" and required to give the www.YouTube-mp3.org domain name to the plaintiffs.

A telemarketing operation that the FTC said bilked consumers out of millions of dollars through "false" money-making schemes involving Amazon-linked websites and grants will be banned from the payment processing business under a settlement, said the agency in a Friday news release. Commissioners voted 2-0 to file the complaint and order, which was entered by the District Court for the District of Arizona Thursday. Utah-based G2 Consulting and owner Chad Gettel, in prison for pleading guilty to related mail fraud charges, operated schemes in the Phoenix area, said the agency. The order imposes a $3 million judgment that, because the defendants cannot pay, will be suspended unless they misrepresented their financial status.

Operators of an alleged telemarketing scheme will be banned from selling business opportunities and government grant products and services in a settlement with the FTC, said the agency in a Thursday news release. Commissioners voted 2-0 approved final orders that were entered by the District Court for the District of Arizona against defendants Stephanie Bateluna, Carl Morris Jr., Stacey Vela and Paramount Business Services. Each order imposes a judgment of more than $11.8 million but will be partially suspended for Bateluna, Vela and Paramount after they surrender assets. The FTC complaint last year (see 1610280023) said telemarketers "falsely" promised consumers creation of a retail website linked to Amazon that would generate income for consumers. Operators also falsely promised guaranteed government grants worth at least tens of thousands of dollars if consumers paid them thousands of dollars. Contact information for the defendants couldn't be found.

An Information Technology Industry Council division is pleased with a White House report released Wednesday that outlines recommendations for modernizing outdated federal IT systems. In a Thursday statement, Trey Hodgkins, senior vice president-public sector for the IT Alliance for Public Sector, said after administration officials met with tech company CEOs in June (see 1706200017 and 1706220054), industry experts developed "ambitious recommendations for the government to modernize its computer systems, adopt new technologies, and strengthen its cybersecurity capabilities." He said industry will offer those recommendations in early September after reviewing the White House report. The administration is seeking input before Sept. 20.

Qualcomm Technologies joined the IoT Cybersecurity Alliance formed earlier this year (see 1702080045) by AT&T, IBM, Nokia, Palo Alto Networks, Symantec and Trustonic, said the Qualcomm subsidiary in a Wednesday news release.

The Online Trust Alliance said additional improvements are needed in an anti-spam law, in comments to the FTC, which is seeking input on the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing (Can-Spam) Act by Thursday (see 1706220013). OTA, an Internet Society initiative, said the law and business self-regulation have slowed spam growth and recommended changes without imposing extra costs for organizations. They include providing additional examples about the placement, color, size and terminology of the opt-out option; enabling consumers to opt out of multiple mail streams through one request; specifying the "from" line in an email since email headers or mass email services have many "from" addresses; clarifying new types of "informational" messages like alerts about news, product updates and site activity; and giving opt-out lists a "lifetime e.g., 5 years), after which the names must be purged from the system" but not subject to enforcement unless a customer relationship is restarted. OTA Director Jeff Wilbur said in a news release its recent audit found 94 percent of top retailers honored an unsubscribe request within three business days. Companies including Act-On Software, American Greetings, LashBack, Optizmo, PeopleConnect, PostUp, ValiMail and Yes Lifecycle Marketing contributed to OTA's comments. Nearly 80 people, including University of California, Berkeley School of Law adjunct law professor and FTC expert Chris Hoofnagle, have filed comments in Project No. R711010. Hoofnagle said there's a continuing need for the Can-Spam rule and the technical interventions can reduce spam.

Amazon’s Alexa and Microsoft’s Cortana voice engines will be able to communicate later this year, the companies announced Wednesday. Consumers can tell Alexa to “open Cortana” or tell a Windows 10 device to open Alexa, they said. Alexa users will be able to access Cortana to book a meeting, access a calendar or read work email through Office 365 integration, said the companies. Cortana customers will be able to ask Alexa to control their smart home devices, shop on Amazon and interact with Alexa skills built by third-party developers, they said. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos cited a “big” and “multifaceted” world, saying there will be “multiple successful intelligent agents, each with access to different sets of data and with different specialized skill areas.” Together, their strengths “will complement each other” and create richer and “more helpful” experiences, Bezos said.