Google Inc. inadvertently provided the personal data of people who bought smartphone applications via its Google Checkout settlement service to app developers.
The information includes customers' names, phone numbers and home and email addresses.
An official at Google Japan Inc. issued an apology for the leak.
Google had stopped passing on phone numbers by Thursday, the official said, adding the incident was the result of "a system malfunction."
While it is unclear how long the malfunction continued, it may have impacted application purchasers worldwide. (Japan Times)
Google Japan leaks app buyers' data to developers
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Fewest crimes in 30 years seen in '11
The number of crimes handled by police in 2011 declined 6.6 percent from the previous year to about 1.48 million, falling below 1.5 million cases for the first time in 30 years, preliminary data by the National Police Agency showed Thursday.
The number of crimes is almost half the record-high 2.85 million Penal Code violations of 2002, and marks the ninth straight yearly fall. An agency official laid the drop to "effective countermeasures against street crimes," including muggings and purse-snatchings.
(Japan Times)
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Noda replaces 5 Cabinet ministers
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda reshuffled his Cabinet on Friday, appointing former Democratic Party of Japan Secretary General Katsuya Okada as deputy prime minister.
The move was made to fortify government leadership to promote integrated reform of the social security and tax systems, as well as administrative reform. Okada will double as a state minister to act as a control tower in pushing the reforms through, particularly the proposed consumption tax rate hike.
Noda replaced five ministers in total, including Defense Minister Yasuo Ichikawa and consumer affairs minister Kenji Yamaoka, both of whom were censured by the House of Councillors last month.
Noda appointed the DPJ's Diet Affairs Committee Chairman Hirofumi Hirano as education, culture, sports, science and technology minister. (Yomiuri)
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Iranian oil cut a source of worry
Japan must now tackle the difficult task of finding an alternative crude oil supplier following a decision to gradually reduce crude oil imports from Iran, which supplies 10 percent of the nation's crude oil.
The government officially informed U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner of the decision Thursday.
The United States had pressured Japan to reduce Iran-produced crude over allegations that the Middle Eastern nation is engaged in programs to develop nuclear weapons.
At a joint press conference with Geithner on Thursday, Finance Minister Jun Azumi said, "We can't overlook the problem of Iran's nuclear development. We want to take actions to decrease oil imports [from Iran] at an early date in an organized manner." (Yomiuri)
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Japanese department store makes grovelling apology after plastering shop windows with 'F***in' Sale' posters
Mortified bosses of a Japanese department store were forced into a grovelling apology after plastering their windows with signs boasting a 'F***in' Sale'.
The Galerie shop in Osaka hung giant red signs emblazoned with the term all over their window display - as well as throughout the shop - to emphasise just how good they thought their January sale was.
The unfortunate slogan was meant to be a pun on fukubukuro - or 'lucky bags' - relating to the Japanese New Year retail custom of selling off discounted unwanted stock from the previous year in big grab bags.
Obviously, the pun was lost on English-speaking visitors to the store, and while most were amused by the unsubtle example of the language barrier, others complained.
(Daily Mail)
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Virus attacks Japanese Space Agency computer
A computer virus infected a data terminal at Japan's space agency, causing a leak of potentially sensitive information, officials announced today (Jan. 13).
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) discovered the malware Jan. 6 on a terminal used by one of its employees. A trace showed that the computer virus had gathered information from the machine, officials said.
JAXA still isn't sure how the virus got on the computer, or who put it there.
The employee in question works on JAXA's H-2 Transfer Vehicle, an unmanned vessel that ferries cargo to the International Space Station. Information about the robotic spacecraft and its operations may thus have been compromised, officials said, along with stored email addresses and system login information accessed from the infected computer. (discovery.com)
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Kaneko's next stage
The opportunity came as a shock.
Jun Kaneko had been a sculptor and painter for decades. But when the invitation came to create sets and costumes for an opera - "Madama Butterfly" - he wasn't even sure it was serious. He knew nothing about opera and had never designed for the stage.
That began a journey he's still on. Since spending three years on Puccini's ever-popular "Butterfly" - which Opera Carolina will perform beginning Saturday, using Kaneko's creations - he has turned to two more operas. He's now finishing "The Magic Flute," Mozart's fairy-tale opera, for Charlotte's opera company and two others.
Obviously, Kaneko said yes to the invitation for "Butterfly" - the story of a geisha whose marriage to an American sailor ends tragically. But the project's attraction was one you might not guess. (charlotteobserver.com)
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Marine saves local Japanese woman's life
Cpl. Eric J. Hansen put his training to work recently, saving an elderly woman's life in Mihama.
Hansen, a Marine with Marine Air Support Squadron 2, was eating at a local restaurant with friends Kathy Linker, Lisa A. Verville and Maelo Cains when they noticed a group of people panicking.
"I looked to my right, where the victim's family was sitting, and noticed that two of the family members were sticking their hands in the grandma's mouth and patting her on the back," said Linker.
Linker announced to her table that she thought the woman might be choking and realized the family needed assistance.
"I was at the table gesturing to the woman's family members the Heimlich maneuver as soon as I realized what was going on," said Hansen. Hansen received training on the Heimlich maneuver while attending Eastern Illinois University and also during recruit training. (military.com)
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Is Hollywood 'whitewashing' Asian roles?
America's embrace of Japanese pop culture, particularly manga and anime, hasn't resulted in an embrace of Asian and Asian-American actors when those storylines go to Hollywood.
Two upcoming feature films based on Japanese material are already stirring controversy after rumors that white American actors will be cast as characters originally written as Japanese.
Tom Cruise is rumored to be in talks to play the lead role in the Warner Bros. adaptation of Japanese novel "All You Need is Kill," replacing a Japanese main character. Warner Bros., which is owned by the same parent company as CNN, is also in the pre-production stages of making a live-action version of "Akira," a graphic novel that was made into a landmark 1988 animated feature film in Japan. All of the actors rumored to be in consideration for the upcoming film's main characters are white Americans, although casting calls invited actors of "any race" to audition.
That's troubling to both the series' devoted fans and advocates of diversity in casting. (CNN)
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Facebook and Japan finally friend each other
Facebook has always been a fringe player in Japan's social networking culture. As of one year ago, according to analytics site Socialbakers, about 2% of Japan's online population was registered on Facebook, compared with roughly 60% in the United States. Homegrown sites like Mixi, GREE and Mobage-town have dominated the sector, each counting a user base in excess of 20 million-about 10 times greater than Facebook's January 2011 totals. And according to a recent report from comScore, Japan is the only market where Twitter is more popular than Mark Zuckerberg's juggernaut.
There are many reasons why Facebook has started slow in Japan, but perhaps the most resounding is that its competitors offer their customers a highly prized shield of anonymity. Japanese people typically don't divulge their real names on the web, instead opting for pseudonyms that allow them to freely express themselves without fear of reproach. (canadianbusiness.com)
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Japan hands over whaling activists to Australia
Japan on Friday handed over to Australian authorities three anti-whaling activists held aboard a Japanese vessel after illegally boarding the ship to protest Japan's annual whale hunt in Atlantic waters.
The three Australian men were transferred onto Ocean Protector, an Australian customs ship, a spokesman for the Japanese Fisheries Agency said, declining to be identified as is customary in Japan. The activists were released without charge.
The men had been questioned by Japan's Coast Guard after boarding the Shonan Maru #2, a patrol vessel supporting the whaling mission in Antarctic waters, on Sunday.
Australia engaged in diplomatic discussions with Japan to ensure the well-being and release of the three men. Australia opposes Japan's whale hunt, but the incident did not occur in Australian territorial waters, meaning that the country's law did not automatically apply to the case. (CNN)
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Energy-hungry Japan in $34 bln Australia gas deal
Japanese energy firm Inpex and French giant Total on Friday announced a huge $34 billion gas project in Australia, as Tokyo looks for alternatives to nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima disaster.
Japan has virtually no hydrocarbon resources of its own and is the world's biggest importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to drive its energy-hungry economy, the third largest on the planet.
The project will see gas from the Ichthys field, in the Browse Basin off Western Australia, piped to Darwin, where it will be converted into liquid at a vast processing plant producing 8.4 million tonnes of LNG a year.
The figure represents more than 10 percent of Japan's current gas consumption, Inpex said, and most of it will be shipped to Japan, with about 20 percent being bought by a Taiwanese firm. (AFP)
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Japan disaster builds international bridges
Out of the tragedy of ruin wreaked by the tsunami that laid waste to large stretches of Japan's northeast coast, a beacon of international friendship has risen.
In a famously homogenous country where foreign faces are rarely seen outside the major cities, international volunteers have poured in to help the victims of Japan's March 2011 earthquake disaster put their lives back together.
Ishinomaki has never been on the foreign tourist trail. A year ago it had a sprinkling of non-Japanese that included English teachers, but it was not a place that many outside Japan had ever heard of.
However, in the ten months since huge waves crushed large areas of the city, washing away or badly damaging half of its 61,000 houses, thousands of people have offered to lend a hand, many of them from abroad. (AFP)
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Japan says sorry for Darwin bombing
Japan's government has used a gathering in Darwin to apologise for the country's bombing of the city during World War II.
Japan's Senior Vice Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry, Tadahiro Matsushita, told a signing ceremony for the $US34 billion Ichthys gas project that he was sorry for his country's actions.
"I am aware that this year is the 70th anniversary of Darwin's bombing and during a certain period in the not-too-distant past, Japan caused tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries," Mr Matsushita said.
Japanese officials have in the past apologised for the country's actions in World War II, but Mr Matsushita is believed to be the most senior politician to apologise on Northern Territory soil for the bombing of Darwin. (Sydney Morning Herald)
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Louvre to send artworks to Japan's Fukushima
France's Louvre museum plans to send more than 20 artworks to Japan, including Fukushima prefecture, near the stricken nuclear plant, in order to show solidarity with the disaster-hit country.
The exhibition will run from April 20 to September 17 in Japan's Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures, said Jean-Luc Martinez, director of the department of Greek, Etruscan and Roman Antiquities at the Louvre.
The artworks -- 23 paintings, sculptures, drawings and other works from different eras and civilizations -- will arrive July 28 at the Fukushima prefecture arts museum. (AFP)
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Nikkei climbs 1.1 pct after Spain, Italy auctions
Japan's Nikkei average rose
more than 1 percent to hit a one-week high on Friday, boosted by
gains on Wall Street and solid demand at debt auctions in Spain
and Italy, which are now at the forefront of the euro zone debt
crisis.
Many major exporters with exposure to Europe were in demand
as the euro gained against the yen on the back of the debt
sales. Canon put on 2.3 percent and Konica
rose 1.3 percent.
Inpex Corp, Japan's top oil and gas explorer, added
1.2 percent after saying it has decided to go ahead with the $34
billion Ichthys liquefied natural gas export project in
Australia, in which it has a 73 percent stake.
Among engineering firms involved in the project, JGC Corp
climbed 5.2 percent and Chiyoda Corp gained
3.6 percent.
(Reuters)
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New minister won't shirk from hangings
New Justice Minister Toshio Ogawa indicated he may issue execution orders as the number of death-row inmates has grown to a postwar high of around 130, but suggested that condemned Aum Shinrikyo members may not face the gallows anytime soon.
"It's a very hard duty, but I have to take responsibility (for authorizing executions)," Ogawa said Friday at his first news conference since assuming the post. "It isn't in line with the spirit of the law for the number of death-row inmates to continue increasing without executions."
No hangings were carried out in 2011, the first full year since 1992 in which no inmates were executed.
(Japan Times)
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Noda frets over Japan's credit rating
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda on Saturday expressed concern about Japan maintaining its sovereign debt rating, after France lost its coveted triple-A credit status the previous day.
"The European crisis is not a fire on the other side of the river. Even France's rating has been lowered. If we continue to mismanage fiscal issues, Japan will (be next)," he said on a program broadcast by TV Tokyo.
Standard & Poor's Ratings Services said Friday it has downgraded its long-term French bond rating by one notch from the highest AAA level, and has also lowered its ratings for eight other eurozone countries.
(Japan Times)
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Sumo: Hakuho, Baruto still tied for tourney lead at 7-0
Before the strike of the final wooden clapper, Mongolian yokozuna Hakuho was already locked into his hyper-focused zenlike state.
Kitataiki (1-6) became the object of his wrath in a controlled display of force once the day's final bout at the New Year Grand Sumo Tournament got under way on Saturday.
Hakuho improved his unblemished mark to 7-0, Baruto stayed in a dead heat with the yokozuna but Kotooshu was sent tumbling to his first defeat as week one of the 15-day meet wrapped up in front of a packed house at Ryogoku Kokugikan. (Japan Times)
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Firms look to hire foreign students
Hundreds of foreign students from Japan's top universities turned up at a career forum Saturday in Tokyo, hoping to secure a job before their graduation in 2013.
Clad in dark suits, the students flocked to Tokyo Dome City in Bunkyo Ward to attend briefings by 47 firms - including First Retailing Co., Sony Corp. and Mitsubishi Electric Corp.
A total of 1,560 students, mostly Asian, registered to attend the Tokyo event and a job fair in Osaka on Sunday, both organized by recruitment consultancy Fourth Valley Concierge Corp. (Japan Times)
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