You’d think they’d be ahead of the curve, given their lines of business. But many technology, media, and telecommunications companies are not eating their own security dog food, according to a study published earlier today.According to the study, conducted by Deloitte & Touche, some 46 percent of high-tech companies surveyed do not have a formal information security strategy in place. Despite this lack of strategy, however, 69 percent report they are “very confident” or “extremely confident” about their organization’s effectiveness at tackling external security challenges.This confidence is surprising, given the rest of the survey results. Just 7 percent of high-tech companies believe they are prepared for future security threats. In the past year, only 5 percent of the respondents had increased their security investment by 15 percent or more.Only 38 percent of companies believe their organizations have all the skills and capabilities they need to respond effectively and efficiently to security challenges. Just 56 percent feel confident in their company’s ability to handle employee misconduct and insider threats. Some 38 percent said they don’t believe security is an imperative at the executive or board level, Deloitte said.”The technology, media & entertainment and telecommunications industries are still in a reactive mode when it comes to their approach to security,” said Rena Mears, Deloitte global and U.S. privacy and data protection leader.

The ‘Fourth Screen’

“Air Wave” is the name for Microsoft’s new technology to create a “fourth screen” experience beyond the TV, PC and mobile phone that allows advertisers to engage consumers in public places such as airports or shopping malls. The technology uses an interactive, multitouch screen display to let consumers play games or interact with advertisements to receive coupons or product information, for instance. With the help of a webcam, consumers can even try on products such as sunglasses virtually, Microsoft said.Microsoft’s contextual ad technology for video, meanwhile, uses speech recognition to enable ads to be dynamically served based on the content discussed in the video. That way, ads related to gardening or lawn improvement could be served adjacent to a video about gardening, Microsoft said.Another technology Microsoft demonstrated Tuesday uses a computer vision algorithm to approximate human judgment in deciding the least intrusive spot in a video in which to place ads.

Screening Out Porn

A visual product browsing tool, meanwhile, uses computer vision algorithms to browse and categorize images as a human might, without the need for manual data tagging. Such technology could help online shoppers visually browse categorized images of products such as lamps and narrow their search to find “more like this” options through physical and visual characteristics such as the product’s height, depth and width.Microsoft’s new content analysis engine automatically extracts and categorizes information from search queries and Web pages to better understand user intent and minimize search engine marketing complexity. Accordingly, it could help search engine marketers discover valuable keywords relevant to their category or bid on categories, such as digital cameras, instead of managing each individual keyword associated with a category.A new content detection technology identifies sensitive content advertisers would not likely want to be associated with — pornography or weapons, for example — and automatically blocks contextual ads related to that content.Finally, a new adCenter dashboard gives marketers access to analytics and advanced algorithms that are tied to actual data sets from adCenter to help them maximize the effectiveness of their search marketing campaigns.

Which Platform Will Survive?

With aQuantive and one of the largest online publishing operations on the Web, Microsoft’s portfolio “puts it in a position to look at what’s lacking technologically on the ad-serving side,” Harry Wang, a research analyst withParks Associates , told the E-Commerce Times. “The technologies they’ve been demonstrating, including contextual ads, are definitely helping advertisers to identify the right type of audiences and understand consumers’ consumption traits online in real time so that they can place the most appropriate ads alongside content.”Given Microsoft’s proposed US$44.6 billion bid to acquire Yahoo, however, it’s not clear how its digitaladvertising plans might proceed if the acquisition goes through.”Assuming the acquisition goes through, which is a reasonable assumption, one of the central questions is, whose platform will survive?” Greg Sterling, founder and principal analyst with Sterling Market Intelligence, told the E-Commerce Times.

The 1,600 Pound Gorilla

Microsoft has talked about wanting a single platform in the long run, and “to me, that directly implicated the two ad platforms,” Sterling said. Yet Yahoo’s Panama platform has more advertisers, so “this is an example of the larger conundrum for them,” Sterling explained.Specifically, “do you risk migrating Panama advertisers to adCenter and losing some, with the inevitable glitches that arise in such a transition, or do you walk away from this effort that has been such a tremendous focus and investment?” he said. “I think it’s a very difficult question, and it’s a metaphor for the whole problem they face — where to place bets, where to take risks, when to walk away from traffic or customers.”Of course, whichever platform ultimately survives, Microsoft and Yahoo are both “lagging far behind Google in the search area,” Wang noted. “I think this is them joining hands to counter the 1,600-pound gorilla. With that kind of threat, there’s no way for them to go it alone.” 

Canada’s privacy commissioners are concerned about plans to introduce high-tech drivers licences across Canada.The enhanced licences are expected to be available as an alternative to a passport and make it possible for governments to track people and access personal information stored on the licences.The commissioners have told a news conference that the personal information of Canadians’ drivers should stay in Canada if the enhanced driver’s licence program proceeds on a permanent basis.They say there must be meaningful and independent oversight into how U.S. officials receive and use Canadians’ personal information.B.C. and the federal government reached an agreement last month to start issuing the enhanced licences on a trial basis

Pulse 87.7 FM, the rhythmic top 40 station will be launched by Mega Media Group (OTC Bulletin Board: MMDA) (www.megamediagroup.com), on February 11th at 6am, the station will feature the Highly popular Star & Buc Wild Morning Show which will debut on February 18th weekdays from 6 to 10am and today’s top music hits. Joel Salkowitz will become the station’s program director.

Industry Veteran Joel Salkowitz To Lead Station

Salkowitz is a veteran major market programming and operations executive, who recently served as Vice President of Music Programming and Content at Sirius Satellite Radio. Prior to joining Sirius, Salkowitz was with Clear Channel Communications as a Format Director and Brand Manager overseeing the launch and programming for 10 major market stations, as well as serving as Program Director for JAMMIN 105 — New York (WTJM-FM). His past experience also includes management, production and programming positions at Fox Television, E.M.I. Records, Westwood One, ABC Radio, NBC Radio and Emmis Communications. As Regional VP of Programming at Emmis’ HOT97 (WQHT) in New York, he helped develop the Rhythm Top 40 format that dominated contemporary radio during the late 1980s and early 1990s and was also responsible for overseeing programming at Emmis’ WAVA (Washington DC) and WLOL (Minneapolis).

Commenting on the announcement, Mega Media Group CEO, Alex Shvarts stated “I am pleased that Joel is leading our radio team. His wealth of experience with building stations and managing major market radio personnel will prove invaluable to the launch of Pulse 87.”

Also commenting on the announcement, Salkowitz said, “I am excited to be a part of a new, independent radio business that I can help to grow from its very inception. It will be especially gratifying to work with Star who is one of the top morning talents in the country and who was able to have such a huge impact on not one, but two radio stations in New York. He’s a one-of-a-kind personality and together with a unique music format, we’re going to give New York something to get excited about on the radio again.”

Safe Harbor Statement: This announcement contains forward-looking statements. These statements are made under the “safe harbor” provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about Mega Media Group’s beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statements. All information provided in this press release is as of November 15, 2007, and Mega Media Group undertakes no duty to update such information, except as required under applicable law.

SOURCE Mega Media Group

http://www.megamediagroup.com

Warner Music Group Corp., the record company of Led Zeppelin, reported a first-quarter loss on costs to close a business it acquired nine months ago. The shares posted a record drop. The net loss of $16 million, or 11 cents a share, in the three months ended Dec. 31, compares with net income of $18 million, or 12 cents, a year earlier, the New York-based company said today in a statement. Excluding the costs to close the acquired unit, earnings of 1 cent a share missed the 12-cent average of seven analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

Warner Music, facing an industrywide decline in compact disc sales, bought concert company Bulldog Entertainment in May to try to boost revenue. It shut down the unit at a cost of $18 million. Revenue rose 6.6 percent to $989 million, driven by Josh Groban’s album “Noel” and currency changes. Excluding the changes, sales rose 1 percent, the first increase in six quarters.

“The write-off shows they were entering a business they arguably shouldn’t have gotten into in the first place,” said Chris White, an analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities in Los Angeles who recommends holding the shares and doesn’t own them. “Revenue growth is still decent but supported by acquisitions that are questionable.”

Warner Music, the world’s third largest record company, tumbled $1.59, or 18 percent, to $7.15 at 10:32 a.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading after dropping as much as 19 percent, the most since the company went public in May 2005. The shares had declined 58 percent in the past 12 months before today on concern gains in digital sales won’t make up for the decline in higher-priced CDs.

Not `Standing Still’

Chief Executive Officer Edgar Bronfman is also trying to increase sales by adding merchandising and management services. Warner Music invested $50 million in a joint venture with Frank Sinatra’s family last year to market his music and videos as well as his name and likeness. It also paid about $110 million for a stake in artist management company Front Line Management.

Investments and acquisitions are likely to be smaller this year than in 2007, Chief Financial Officer Michael Fleisher said today on a conference call.

“While we were obviously disappointed with” Bulldog Entertainment, Bronfman said on the call, “we continue to believe that taking prudent risks to expand and enlarge our revenue opportunities is a far better strategy than standing still.”

(The company held a conference call to discuss the results at 8:30 a.m. New York time. For a replay, dial +1-888-566-0618 or +1-203-369-3076.)

To contact the reporter on this story: Don Jeffrey in New York at djeffrey1@bloomberg.net