■COMPUTERS
Data hold time may be cut
Microsoft said yesterday it was prepared to cut the amount of time it retains Internet users’ search data to six months from 18 if other Web giants also agreed to do so. The EU is piling pressure on Internet companies to reduce the amount of time they hold users’ personal Web searching data, saying in April that there was no basis for such information to be kept more than six months. Microsoft’s arch-rival Google said in September that it was halving the amount of time it keeps search data associated with a user’s unique Internet address to nine months from 18 months. “Microsoft evaluated the multiple uses of search data and is prepared to move to a six-month timeframe,” the US software giant said in a statement.
■SINGAPORE
More job cuts expected
More job cuts are expected in the first quarter of next year, a survey reported by the Straits Times showed yesterday. About half of the 629 bosses surveyed intend to cut jobs in the first three months of next year, compared with 10 percent who were polled on staff cuts between October and last month. The jobs cuts will be through retrenchments, not replacing staff who leave, and freezing hiring plans, it said, citing a survey by global human resource consultancy Manpower Inc, which had polled the 629 employers in Singapore. The survey showed that 46 percent of the bosses polled were expected to cut jobs while only 8 percent intended to recruit.
■SOUTH KOREA
IMF predicts recovery
The country’s economy, buffeted by the global meltdown, is fading fast but looks set to slowly recover next year, an IMF official said yesterday. “General measures of economic activity are decelerating rapidly,” Subir Lall, division chief in the Washington-based organization’s Asia-Pacific department, said in a speech. Lall cited slowdowns in consumer spending and exports as well as falling business confidence as evidence for the emerging weakness in Asia’s fourth-largest economy. The IMF is predicting economic growth of 2 percent next year for South Korea, compared with 5 percent last year.
■AUSTRALIA
Confidence at record low
Business confidence held at a record low last month, reinforcing speculation the economy may slide into its first recession since 1991. The sentiment index fell 1 point to minus 30 from October, the lowest level since the series began in 1989, according to a National Australia Bank Ltd survey of more than 560 companies conducted between Nov. 23 and Nov. 30. “The results of the November survey make grim reading,” said Alan Oster, chief economist at National Australia in Melbourne. “The financial crisis is now having real effects on the Australian economy, with significant revisions down on business views about future employment and investment.”
■AUTOMOBILES
Japan tests battery stations
Better Place, a US company that promotes electric vehicles, said yesterday it would build battery exchange stations in Japan as part of a government pilot project to encourage the use of green cars. Better Place builds battery exchange stations, where drivers with no time to charge can trade drained batteries for charged ones — providing infrastructure that helps make electric vehicles more practical. The Japanese Environment Ministry invited Better Place to take part in the feasibility project for three to six months, starting next month in the port city of Yokohama, Better Place said.
STILL COMMITTED: The US opposes any forced change to the ‘status quo’ in the Strait, but also does not seek conflict, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said US President Donald Trump’s administration released US$5.3 billion in previously frozen foreign aid, including US$870 million in security exemptions for programs in Taiwan, a list of exemptions reviewed by Reuters showed. Trump ordered a 90-day pause on foreign aid shortly after taking office on Jan. 20, halting funding for everything from programs that fight starvation and deadly diseases to providing shelters for millions of displaced people across the globe. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has said that all foreign assistance must align with Trump’s “America First” priorities, issued waivers late last month on military aid to Israel and Egypt, the
France’s nuclear-powered aircraft carrier and accompanying warships were in the Philippines yesterday after holding combat drills with Philippine forces in the disputed South China Sea in a show of firepower that would likely antagonize China. The Charles de Gaulle on Friday docked at Subic Bay, a former US naval base northwest of Manila, for a break after more than two months of deployment in the Indo-Pacific region. The French carrier engaged with security allies for contingency readiness and to promote regional security, including with Philippine forces, navy ships and fighter jets. They held anti-submarine warfare drills and aerial combat training on Friday in
COMBAT READINESS: The military is reviewing weaponry, personnel resources, and mobilization and recovery forces to adjust defense strategies, the defense minister said The military has released a photograph of Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) appearing to sit beside a US general during the annual Han Kuang military exercises on Friday last week in a historic first. In the photo, Koo, who was presiding over the drills with high-level officers, appears to be sitting next to US Marine Corps Major General Jay Bargeron, the director of strategic planning and policy of the US Indo-Pacific Command, although only Bargeron’s name tag is visible in the seat as “J5 Maj General.” It is the first time the military has released a photo of an active
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
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