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The top IT industry stories from September 2008

HP has announced it will cut 24,600 jobs and $1.8 billion from its books over the next three years, as it merges with IT services firm EDS.

Half the job cuts are expected to occur in the US, with most of the losses expected to be among EDS employees in finance, HR and legal departments.

HP CEO Mark Hurd said: “HP has a strong track record of making acquisitions and integrating them to capture-leading market positions. We will deliver on the promise of HP and EDS for our customers and shareholders."

Lloyds TSB has been told by its workers to stop offshore outsourcing in a bid to compensate for job losses following its forthcoming merger with HBOS, reports TSB Group Union.

Lloyds TSB has around 3,000 IT and back office jobs in India. The union says that ‘repatriating’ those jobs would save the organisation £1 billion in redundancy payments by 2011.

Meanwhile, the US credit crunch and a rapid rise in the rupee is creating a boom in India's IT spending as local businesses take advantage of the country’s considerable skill-set.

Gartner forecasts IT spending in India will reach $110 billion by 2012, a growth rate of nearly 15% a year.

The software market alone is expected to reach $3.4 billion by 2012, while the subcontinent’s IT services market is the fastest growing in the Asia-Pacfic region, with an annual growth rate of 20%.

Government support of the industry is key to its continued growth, said Gartner analyst Naveen Mishra.

In a warning to all IT firms that handle sensitive government data, the Home Office has terminated a £1.5 million contract with management consultancy firm PA Consulting following its loss of a USB stick containing data on 84,000 prisoners.

The three-year contract will be taken in-house, while the Home Office reviews its other contracts with PA Consulting.

The data was sent to PA Consulting on encrypted CDs but was transferred to an unencrypted memory stick by an employee in breach of the company’s security policies.

Unisys CEO Joseph McGrath will resign at the end of this year.

McGrath, who has been CEO since 2005, will continue to run the company until a successor is found. His departure would “best enable Unisys to move forward on accelerating execution of the company’s strategy”, a company statement said. Unisys’ stock price rose by 2% following the announcement.

Online banking fraud in the UK increased by 185% in the first six months of the year, to £21.4 million, according to the UK payments association APACS.

Meanwhile, card fraud losses reached a record high of more than £300 million, an increase of 14% on last year. According to APACS, 40% of the losses were attributable to card-not-present (CNP) fraud in countries without the chip and PIN security feature. CNP accounts for half of all industry losses.