Microsoft is investigating a newly reported flaw in Internet Explorer 6 that could cause the browser to crash when viewing a malicious Web page, the company said Monday. The flaw can be exploited by an attacker to crash IE, Secunia said in an advisory published Monday. The vulnerability has been confirmed on a fully patched PC running IE 6 and Windows XP with Service Pack 2, the security monitoring company said. Secunia deems the issue "not critical."

On Monday, Microsoft Research said it will give Rhode Island’s Brown University $1.2 million over the next three years to develop software for recognizing complex handwriting and gestures, the Associated Press reports via Boston.com. A number of computer systems already process handwriting, such as credit card readers. Brown is currently working on applications that can interpret lettering and symbols of increasing complexity, for use in such areas as math, chemistry and music.

Google says it will comply with a court order that it let the U.S. Department of Justice see a selection of its Web sites, but not the search terms the government also requested. Google says it plans to let the U.S. government examine a minuscule snippet of its stockpile of indexed Web sites. The company was ordered to do just that on March 17 by U.S. District Court Judge James Ware. Ware has given Google, based in Mountain View, Calif., until April 3 to hand over a randomly generated selection of about 50,000 Web sites that could be included in its search results.

Microsoft’s Mix conference this week in Las Vegas will be the venue for news surrounding its Web 2.0 strategy. A key part of that strategy is Atlas, the company’s AJAX development tool, for which Microsoft will release a new preview at the show. Microsoft will announce a March CTP (Community Technology Preview) of the Asynchronous JavaScript and XML tool with a Go-Live license, officials said. The Atlas March CTP with Go-Live license enables developers to begin building and deploying new Atlas applications and to extend applications that they can redistribute commercially.

Microsoft has long viewed the software world through Windows. Now, it’s hoping to prove that it understands the growing popularity of Web technologies beyond its own operating system. Chairman Bill Gates delivered a keynote speech at Mix ’06, the first edition of a Microsoft conference aimed at developers building new-style online applications that combine Web and mobile access. The Microsoft chairman said, in essence, that the development world has changed with the advent of new Web technologies that give people any time, any place access to their data–a far cry from the PC-centric world of the past.

United Online announced that its social networking subsidiary, Classmates Online has acquired Opobox, which operates The Names Database, for approximately $10 million in cash. The Names Database is a social networking service that helps members find, connect and keep in touch with friends, family and classmates throughout the world. All member email addresses are kept secure and private, and are never shown on the site. Instead, Namesdatabase.com acts as an intermediary between members, who can send messages through the site to each other.

In a move that alleviates some privacy concerns, a federal judge granted part of a Justice Department request for Google search data but said users’ search queries were off-limits. The 21-page order issued Friday in San Jose, by U.S. District Judge James Ware, represented little change from his stance at an earlier hearing.

At Microsoft, it’s no longer just about bits and bytes. The company has for years marketed its products to the tech elite within big companies. Now Microsoft is making concerted effort to speak the language of top executives. Why? Because business managers, marketing executives and other nontechies are increasingly involved in technology purchasing decisions, Microsoft argues. Another reason for the shift is IBM. Microsoft’s chief rival in the business software area has been pitching to CEOs for years, relying on its business-savvy consultants to help win deals. In essence, Microsoft needs to speak Big Blue’s language.

The U.S. arm of credit and debit card giant Visa International has issued an alert for flaws in cash-register software made by Fujitsu Transaction Solutions that could put sensitive cardholder information at risk. According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, the bug can cause the inadvertent storage of customer data–including secret PINs–within the point-of-sale software installed in retail locations. The report said Visa USA sent the warning to "merchant acquirers" that process card transactions for some of the biggest names in retail and urged users to apply a software upgrade from Fujitsu to fix the flaw. Officials from Visa USA and Fujitsu could not be reached for comment at press time but, according to the newspaper, the confidential alert was sent several days ago to raise awareness about the bug.

Several news reports suggest Time Warner plans to resurrect its once high-flying Netscape division by turning it into a social networking hub. Media tracker Paid Content.org says the Netscape name is soon to be attached to a social networking Web site, in which news stories and other items can be freely traded. In order to do this, over the last few weeks Netscape owner Time Warner has fired some of its Netscape-focused employees and plans to install a new director, Jason Calacanis, according to the ValleyWag Web site. Time Warner owns Weblogs, which Calacanis runs.