Welcome to the world of Vishing or voice phishing, wherein hackers are using a combination of voice over internet protocol, SMSs and the internet to fool and redirect users into dialling a phone number and collect critical information for financial gain. In Kolaskar's case, both mobile spam and vishing were used.
A team of engineers at India's largest IT services provider firm. Tata Consultancy Services, was working on a project for an important client. While it was co-ordinating work from three geographical units - Europe, South America and India - it was finding it difficult to collaborate through telephone or other voice means as there were language and pronunciation hurdles.
VMIL officials declined to comment on the development. According to sources close to the development, VMIL will sell stake to raise money for expanding Hungama, the content and mobile services arm. The Mumbai-based company has already held two to three rounds of meetings with these private equity investors. The company's valuation has been pegged at Rs 800 crore (Rs 8 billion). The funds raised would be used for Hungama's expansion.
The Finnish handset giant, however, has never been able to cope with the mystique that surrounds Apple CEO Steve Jobs' iPhone, which has been illegally imported and unlocked by hundreds of Indians -- corporate chiefs and celebrities included. Jobs has now announced a 3G version of the device with full global positioning system for just $199 (around Rs 8,400) for the 8GB model and $299 (Rs 12,600) for the 16GB version.
Major IT firms Dell, Intel, Aricent, HCL Technologies, Wipro, Lenovo, Nokia and Tulip Telecom, among others, have realised that "going green" is profitable business. Not only does it require a low initial investment but it also earns them brownie points for helping in reducing e-waste.
Aegis BPO Services, an Essar Group business process outsourcing (BPO) company, is close to acquiring an 8,000-seater BPO firm in the Philippines. The exact size of the deal is not clear.Aegis has been bullish on inorganic growth as its races to reach a turnover of $500 million (around Rs 2,000 crore) by 2010.
Have you ever travelled on business and yearned for a quiet, memorable place to stay in, away from hordes of other business travellers? Or if on a vacation, have you longed for a unique experience? If you have, small, independently-owned boutique hotels are the answer. And these days it is not too difficult to find such properties, thanks to entrepreneurs like Mamta Sharma.
US-based buyout fund Carlyle, Providence Equity Partners, Warburg Pincus and Blackstone are understood to be exploring a buyout of Temasek's holding in Mumbai-based pure-play business process outsourcing firm Firstsource. The news triggered the company's share price to rise 6.76 per cent on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) to close at Rs 43.45 on Tuesday. Warburg Pincus has a stake in WNS, a BPO company, while Blackstone has a majority stake in Intelenet.
Raman's hacking expertise is much in demand -- and not from criminal elements. Indian firms and multinationals like ABN Amro Bank, Aditya Birla Group, Bank of Maharashtra, Bombay Dyeing, HSBC, ICICI Bank, Indiabulls, Centurion BOP, Citibank, India Infoline, Ispat Industries and Kotak Group proactively seek his services. Raman's hacking expertise is much in demand -- and not from criminal elements.
By far the most awaited game of the year, Grand Theft Auto IV (GTA IV) takes gamers on the streets of Liberty City, a dystopic version of New York City in 2008. What propels this violent, intelligent, profane, endearing, obnoxious, sly, richly textured and thoroughly compelling work of cultural satire is the fun factor weaved into every scene. GTA IV has vehicles that look even more fantastic.
The broad idea is to help freshers and high-potential employees develop soft skills not generally taught at universities, and simultaneously increase retention rates in an industry that has attrition rates between 30 and 50 per cent. The industry, according to Nasscom estimates, accounts for almost $11 billion and employs slightly over 700,000 professionals (in terms of direct employment).
In what will be the first such comprehensive exercise in the IT industry, all the 91,000-odd employees of India's second-largest IT services provider, Infosys Technologies, will now have to pass certification programmes to get promoted. The certification programme, conducted every March, is now being extended across the board and will test the employees' domain expertise, and grade them accordingly to be eligible for promotion.
Sluggish volume growth and mark-to-market losses have affected the performance of a majority of mid-cap information technology companies in the January-March 2008 quarter. Analysts expect that growth will continue to be sluggish in the next two quarters.
B K Modi-controlled Spice Mobile is all set to launch its GSM phone for Rs 800 this month. Branded as the 'People's Phone', the handset, a very basic model, doesn't have a display screen. Spice officials believe the company will sell around one million units in India and 10 million globally over the next 12 months.
India's largest IT firm Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) will not announce a cut in variable pay of its employees this year , despite the company reporting a negative net profit on sequential basis.Last quarter, the company had announced a reduction in its staff variable pay as it did not achieve the internal targets.
Entertainment, Dhruva will be working with the company to produce games that could be marketed both in local and international markets. The company will also introduce the use of motion-sensing technology, made popular by Nintendo Wii, to PS2 game developers this year.
Shah Rukh Khan's Kolkata Knight Riders have signed on Zapak Digital Entertainment, a Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG) venture, to develop online games for them. As part of the exclusive one-year tie-up, Zapak will create a cricket gaming zone on the official website of the Knight Riders and is said to make an investment of Rs 1 crore (Rs 10 million) in the deal. The exact value of the deal is not known. The portal has already gone live with two games.
Thanks to the development of power-efficient and smaller components, small form factor desktop PCs from Acer, Dell and HP have become quiet popular among home and professional users. SFF PCs are mostly sold with kits that include a motherboard, case, power supply, and central processing unit (CPU) cooler. This makes them cheaper when compared to professional PCs. Most of the SFF systems in the market are based around Intel processors, particularly the mobile CPUs.
Projectors seem to have come of age and there is no dearth of quality images, if you have the money .
WNS Global Services, India's second largest business processes outsourcing company, has signed on Sri Lankan fast bowler Lasith Malinga as its brand ambassador. It has thus become the first Indian IT services firm to have a brand ambassador. Accenture, a multinational company, is another one that has ace golf player Tiger Woods as its mascot.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances