HP pays $55M fine for allegedly defrauding US government

In today's podcast: RIM wins BlackBerry reprieve in India; HP pays $55M fine for allegedly defrauding US government; and AMD gets ready to drop ATI brand for graphics.

Subscribe to this podcast in iTunes!

Proposals from Research In Motion (RIM) for lawful access of its networks by law enforcement agencies in India are being put into operation immediately, the government said Monday. The government did not disclose specifics of the proposals from RIM. India said earlier this month that it will ask service providers in the country to ensure that some BlackBerry services be made accessible to its law enforcement agencies by Aug. 31 or face a block of these services.

Hewlett-Packard will pay the U.S. government US$55 million to settle allegations that it defrauded the U.S. General Service Administration and other agencies by paying kickbacks to systems integrators in exchange for recommendations that agencies purchase HP products, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Monday. The settlement also resolves government claims that a 2002 contract HP had with the GSA was defectively priced because the company provided incomplete information to GSA contracting officers during negotiations.

Advanced Micro Devices on Monday said it will remove the ATI name from its products by the end of the year, killing a brand name synonymous with graphics enthusiasts for 25 years. AMD offers a range of graphics products under the ATI brand, including the Radeon, FirePro and Eyefinity offerings. The chip designer will instead attach the name AMD to those products by the end of the year,

After months of negotiations, Google has renewed the content licensing deal that allows it to publish full-text news articles from the Associated Press on Google sites such as Google News. A Google statement announcing the deal offered no details about the extension, including its dollar value.

...And those are the top stories from the IDG Global IT News Update, brought to you by the IDG News Service. I'm Sumner Lemon in Singapore. Join us again later for more news from the world of technology.