The source code for Half-Life 2 was stolen and released over the Internet, developer Valve said Thursday. Valve Managing Director Gabe Newell said the company suspects that around Sept. 11, someone hacked his email account. His PC then began acting weird, crashing when he would right-click on executables. Wired Magazine reports that Newell believes keystroke recorders for collecting passwords were installed remotely. He believes this happened through a hole in Microsoft’s Outlook personal-information management application.

CIO Magazine says that SSL VPN (secure sockets layer virtual private network) vendors are introducing features that directly compete with traditional IPsec VPNs. SSL VPN products can securely deliver thin, Web delivered applications and fat-client productivity tools, including Microsoft Outlook, Lotus Notes, and Citrix. Unfortunately, these fat applications are not natively SSL enabled. To accommodate these clients, SSL VPN vendors developed small client-side JAVA and ActiveX clients which intercept and forward traffic on behalf of the fat client.

Bowstreet announced its support for Red Hat Linux and SuSE Linux. Bowstreet Portlet Factory for WebSphere, Bowstreet Portlet Factory Express, and the Lotus Collaboration Extension all run on the Red Hat Linux and SuSE Linux platforms.

SEVEN announced that SEVEN-enabled services are now available to 80 percent of Japanese mobile subscribers. SEVEN-enabled services support mobile devices, including Palm, Pocket PC, J2ME and Symbian; networks, including 2.5 and 3G; and a choice of groupware applications and email protocols, including Microsoft Exchange, Lotus Domino and Internet/ISP email. SEVEN-enabled services are available to individuals, IT organizations and workgroups directly through their mobile operator.

Defywire announced the general availability of Defywire Mobility Suite release 1.6. With release 1.6, Defywire Mobility Suite introduces new security features, integration with front and back office email systems including Microsoft Exchange, Lotus Domino, and Novell GroupWise, and support for additional wireless mobile devices.

Palm released three handheld models and software designed to make the devices more useful in a business environment. Information Week also reports that Palm has also revamped its core applications for Tungstens, making them more friendly with enterprise applications and increasing their compatibility with features such as built-in support for Microsoft Outlook. Beginning Oct. 1, Tungsten users also will be able to download an IBM Java Virtual Machine that will let them run all kinds of Java applications developed for a mobile workforce.

Corex Technologies Corporation announced AccuCard for Outlook, the latest product in its contact maintenance platform, designed to end the problem of out-of-date business contact data. AccuCard for Outlook is an automatic updating service that fully integrates with Microsoft Outlook. The AccuCard for Outlook software, available for a yearly subscription fee of $49.95, provides users with a way to ensure that their contact information is up-to-date and accurate.

PanteraSoft releases Careful Backup 1.53 a dependable backup solution that allows you to schedule different backup tasks to be run automatically. You can back up your data to a variety storage media – floppy disks, hard drives, CDs, and external drives. The program supports built-in recording system for CD-R/RWs run under Windows XP.

G-Lock Software released G-Lock Email Processor 1.70, a Windows application that lets you filter your incoming messages using any specified criteria, extract any data from the message body and message header, save the extracted data to a file of user definable format and/or insert (delete, update) it into a database. Plus, G-Lock Email Processor allows you to send a text or HTML message to your recipients or forward the message to another email address.

News.com reports that Microsoft released Windows SharePoint Services, a free add-on for Windows 2003 that allows companies to set up collaboration sites online. SharePoint Services works with Windows Server 2003 to allow workers to publish documents to a secure Web site, where they can be viewed and manipulated by authorized users. Windows 2003 Server users can download SharePoint Services from Microsoft’s Web site.