TOP NEWS Man arrested after jumping White House fence, causing lockdown

By Jeff Mason



WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A man jumped the White House fence on Wednesday evening and was attacked by Secret Service dogs before being arrested, a Secret Service spokesman said.



"Dogs got him," spokesman Edwin Donovan said, referring to the intruder.



He identified the intruder as Dominic Adesanya, 23, of Bel Air, Maryland, and said he was unarmed at the time of his arrest.



Video showed Secret Service agents surrounding the man on the north lawn of the White House, which was put on lockdown for about 90 minutes. The man punched one of the dogs that attacked him, as seen in the video.



Two Secret Service dogs "were taken to a veterinarian for injuries sustained during the incident," Donovan said.



The incident came roughly a month after an intruder armed with a knife scaled the White House fence and made it inside the executive mansion, raising questions about security levels at the heavily guarded complex and spurring the resignation of then-Secret Service Director Julia Pierson.



The man climbed the fence around 7:15 p.m. (2315 GMT) and was apprehended shortly thereafter. The lockdown was lifted shortly before 9 p.m.



"The individual was immediately taken into custody on the North lawn of the White House by Secret Service Uniformed Division K-9 teams and Uniformed Division Officers," Donovan said. K-9 refers to the team using specially trained dogs.



The man was then transported to a hospital for evaluation, the spokesman said.



The latest White House security breach happened the same day a gunman attacked Canada's parliament in Ottawa.



(Reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Sandra Maler, Peter Cooney and Mohammad Zargham)





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ENTERTAINMENT NEWS: U2 album stumbles in Billboard chart after free iTunes debut

By Piya Sinha-Roy

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - U2's controversial free album on Apple's iTunes had a less than stellar performance once released for commercial sale, coming in at No. 9 in its first week on the Billboard 200 album chart on Wednesday.

Country group Florida Georgia Line far outperformed the Irish rockers by selling 197,000 copies of "Anything Goes" in its first week for the top spot on the chart, compared with U2's 28,000 units sold, according to sales figures compiled by Nielsen SoundScan.

"Songs of Innocence," the 13th studio album from U2, became the largest album release in history after being made available for free in September on Apple Inc's iTunes online store to half a billion iTunes users.

Billboard does not count sales of albums priced under $3.49 for its weekly album chart listings.

U2's lead singer Bono apologized last week to users who objected to receiving an automatic download of the band's latest album, after thousands complained they did not want the album and that it took up precious storage space on Apple devices.

Florida Georgia Line is the third consecutive country music act to top the chart after Jason Aldean, who landed at No. 1 with "Old Boots, New Dirt," and Blake Shelton, who notched the top spot with "Bringing Back the Sunshine" two weeks ago.

Aldean's album dropped to No. 2 this week, while Shelton's record dropped from No. 6 to No. 15.

Other new debuts in the top 10 of the Billboard 200 chart this week include veteran rocker Bob Seger at No. 3 with "Ride Out," and You+Me, the duo formed by pop singer Pink and folk artist Dallas Green from City and Colour, at No. 4 with "Rose Ave."

Rapper The Game debuted at No. 7 with "Blood Moon: Year of the Wolf," former Google employee-turned-rapper Hoodie Allen landed at No. 8 with "People Keep Talking" and British singer Jessie J rounded out the top 10 with "Sweet Talker."

For the week ended Oct. 19, total album sales clocked in at 4.4 million units, down 6 percent from the comparative week in 2013, while year-to-date album sales tallied at 199.93 million, down 14 percent from the same point last year, Billboard said.

(Editing by Mary Milliken and Lisa Shumaker)

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TOP NEWS U.S.-led air strikes killed 553 people in Syria, 32 civilians: monitor

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Air strikes by U.S.-led forces have killed 553 people, including 32 civilians, during a month-long campaign in Syria against Islamic State militants, a Syrian monitoring group which tracks the violence said on Thursday.



The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the majority of the deaths, 464, were Islamic State fighters. Six of the civilians were children and five were women, the Observatory said.



It said 57 members of the al Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front were also killed in the air strikes, which started a month ago. Strikes hit the provinces of Aleppo, Deir al-Zor, Idlib, Raqqa and al-Hassakah, it said.



(Reporting by Oliver Holmes; Editing by Andrew Heavens)





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TOP NEWS Attack on parliament, killing of soldier stun Canada's capital

By Randall Palmer and David Ljunggren

OTTAWA (Reuters) - A gunman attacked Canada's parliament on Wednesday, with shots fired near where Prime Minister Stephen Harper was speaking, and a soldier was killed at a nearby war memorial, stunning the Canadian capital.

The gunman in the parliament building was shot dead, and Harper was safely removed. The killing of the Canadian soldier was the second this week with a possible link to Islamic militants.

Witness accounts indicated the man who shot dead the soldier guarding the National War Memorial in central Ottawa, went on to attack the parliament building minutes later. Canadian police said, however, they could not confirm it was the same person.

The shooting followed an attack on two soldiers in Quebec on Monday carried out by a convert to Islam. U.S. officials said they had been advised the dead gunman in Wednesday's shootings was also a Canadian convert to Islam.

Canadian police were investigating a man named Michael Zehaf-Bibeau as a possible suspect in Wednesday's attack, said a source familiar with the matter. U.S. government sources said he was born Michael Joseph Hall but later changed his name.

Harper was defiant when he spoke on television 10 hours later, with some buildings still under emergency lockdown and police saying they were still looking into the possibility of a second gunman.

Harper said it would become clear in days to come whether the man who launched a gun attack on parliament - and whom he called "a terrorist" - was acting alone or had accomplices. "Let there be no misunderstanding. We will not be intimidated. Canada will never be intimidated," he said.

"In fact this will lead us to strengthen our resolve and redouble our efforts - and those of our national security agencies - to take all necessary steps to identify and counter threats and keep Canada safe here at home."

Canada announced this month it was joining the battle against Islamic State fighters who have taken over parts of Iraq and Syria, and Harper said the attack would prompt Canada to redouble its efforts to fight against "terrorist organizations" abroad.

After Harper spoke, police lifted their blockade of the downtown area except on Parliament Hill.

The attacks in Ottawa and Quebec took place as the Canadian government prepared to boost the powers of its spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Public Safety Minister Stephen Blaney said last week the new legislation would let the agency track and investigate potential terrorists when they travel abroad and ultimately prosecute them.

ATTACK NEAR HARPER

The incident, shocking in Canada's normally tranquil capital, began shortly before 10 a.m. ET (1400 GMT). A construction worker who was on the scene told Reuters he heard a gunshot, and then saw a man with a scarf over his face running towards parliament.

"He was wearing blue pants and a black jacket and he had a double barrelled shotgun and he ran up the side of this building here and hijacked a car at gunpoint," construction worker Scott Walsh told Reuters.

He said the driver got out safely, then the man drove the car to the Centre Block, the main building on Parliament Hill, a sprawling complex of buildings and open space in downtown Ottawa.

The assault in parliament took place very near the room where Harper was meeting with members of his Conservative party, a government minister said. Witnesses said a flurry of shots were fired after a gunman entered the parliament building, pursued by police.

"PM (Harper) was addressing caucus, then a huge boom, followed by rat-a-tat shots. We all scattered. It was clearly right outside our caucus door," Treasury Board Minister Tony Clement told Reuters.

Security in Ottawa came under criticism after the gunman was able to run through the unlocked front door of the main parliament building.

"It caught us by surprise ... If we had known that this was coming, we would have been able to disrupt it," Gilles Michaud, assistant commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, (RCMP) told a news conference.

It was unclear whether there was any connection between Wednesday's shootings and an attack on Monday when a convert to Islam ran down two Canadian soldiers with his car, killing one, near Montreal, before being shot dead by police in the first fatal attack on Canadian soil tied to Islamic militants.

No group, Islamic or otherwise, claimed responsibility for either the attack in Ottawa or the one near Montreal. Monday's attacker, 25-year-old Martin Rouleau, who converted to Islam last year, was among 90 people being tracked by the RCMP on suspicion of taking part in militant activities abroad or planning to do so.

GUNS DRAWN IN PARLIAMENT

From witness accounts it appeared the suspect dashed into parliament, ran past the room where Harper was speaking and was gunned down outside the entrance to the library, only about 60 feet (20 metres) away.

Dramatic video footage posted by the Globe and Mail newspaper showed police with guns drawn inside the main parliament building. At least a dozen loud bangs can be heard on the clip, echoing through the hallway.

Conservative Member of Parliament Peter Goldring said Sergeant-at-Arms Kevin Vickers shot dead the gunman who had been running past the caucus room where Harper was.

He came out of his office with a weapon and fired and apparently dropped him," Goldring said. "He even went back into his office again and reloaded to come out again to give protection, because the sense was that nobody was sure whether it was one person or whether it was multiple people who were involved."

Three people injured in the attacks were treated at hospital and released.

Canada said on Tuesday it had raised the national terrorism threat level to medium from low because of a rise in "general chatter" from radical groups such as Islamic State and al Qaeda but said there had not been a specific threat.

The RCMP's Michaud said the threat level on Parliament Hill had been on medium for some time.

The soldier who died in the shooting at the War Memorial was identified as Cpl. Nathan Cirillo, according to his aunt. It was not clear if Cirillo was armed or not when he was shot.

'YOU ARE IN DANGER HERE'

The attack on the heart of the country's government shook Canada's self-image as generally non-violent, particularly compared to the United States, where gun violence is much more common. Canadian cities and towns hiked security around government buildings, schools and mass transit systems.

When the shooting started, most members of parliament were in the two caucus rooms past which the gunman ran. Members were told to lock or barricade themselves in their rooms or offices, and stay away from the windows.

Pictures sent from both caucus rooms where the parties were meeting showed piles of chairs jammed up against the doors to prevent anyone from entering. Late in the day, many members were allowed to leave.

U.S. officials said there was no specific indication of a similar attack in the United States, a strong Canadian ally, but reinforced warnings to Americans to be alert.

Compared with Capitol Hill in Washington, security on Parliament Hill is fairly low key. Anybody could walk right up to the front door of parliament's Centre Block with arms and explosives without being challenged before entering the front door, where a few guards check accreditation.

Canadian and U.S. stock markets declined after the shootings in Ottawa. The Toronto Stock Exchange's TSX index dropped 1.6 percent, while the S&P 500 gave back 0.7 percent.

Mass shootings are relatively rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and the regulations at one point included a national registry of rifles and shotguns. Legislation was passed in 2012 to scrap the registry.

(Additional reporting by Andrea Hopkins, Allison Martell, Solarina Ho, Euan Rocha and Alastair Sharp in Toronto; Allison Lampert and Leah Schnurr in Ottawa; Jeff Mason, Mark Hosenball and Steve Holland in Washington; Writing by Frances Kerry and Howard Goller; Editing by Peter Galloway and Bernard Orr)

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SHOCKING NEWS: U.S. tightens Ebola monitoring for West African visitors

By Bill Berkrot

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. health officials imposed fresh constraints on Wednesday on people entering the country from three countries at the center of West Africa's Ebola epidemic, mandating that they report their temperature daily and stay in touch with health authorities.

The move announced by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) marked the latest precautions put in place by the U.S. government to stop the spread of the virus, but stopped short of a ban on travelers from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea as demanded by some lawmakers.

The CDC said that, beginning on Monday, travelers from those countries will be directed to check in with health officials every day and report their temperatures and any Ebola symptoms for 21 days, the period of incubation for the virus.

The travelers will be required to provide emails, phone numbers and addresses for themselves and for a friend or relative in the United States covering the 21 days, and the information will be shared with local health authorities.

The travelers also will be required to coordinate with local public health officials if they intend to travel within the United States. If a traveler does not report in, local health officials will take immediate steps to find the person.

CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden told reporters the active monitoring program will remain in place until the outbreak in West Africa is over. The U.N. World Health Organization's latest figures on Wednesday showed at least 4,877 people out of 9,936 cases have died in the outbreak, the worst on record.

"These new measures I'm announcing today will give additional levels of safety so that people who develop symptoms of Ebola are isolated early in the course of their illness," Frieden said. "That will reduce the chance that Ebola will spread from an ill person through close contact and to healthcare workers."

The move builds upon enhanced screening of passengers from the three countries at major U.S. airports for international travel. Beginning Wednesday, travelers from Liberia, Sierra Leone or Guinea were being funneled through one of five major U.S. airports conducting increased screening for the virus.

There are no direct commercial flights to the United States from those countries, but officials say about 150 travelers a day arrive in the United States on trips that originated there.

Six states account for nearly 70 percent of all travelers entering the United States from the affected countries: New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey and Georgia. Officials said the new monitoring will begin in those states first and will be expanded to other states.

The CDC said the active monitoring program affects anyone coming back from the region, including CDC employees and journalists. The agency said all affected travelers when they enter one of the five airports will receive a care kit that contains a tracking log, a pictorial description of symptoms, a thermometer, instructions on how to monitor their temperature and information on what to do if they experience symptoms.

Three Ebola cases have been diagnosed in the United States: Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian who fell ill after flying to the United States in September, and two nurses who treated him at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas. Duncan died on Oct. 8, while the two nurses are being treated at other hospitals.

NEW U.S. EBOLA 'CZAR'

In other developments, Ron Klain, the lawyer appointed by the White House to coordinate the country's response to the outbreak got to work on Wednesday. President Barack Obama was due to meet with Klain later in the day.

Leading drugmakers also gave details of a plan to work together to accelerate the development of an Ebola vaccine, with the aim of producing millions of doses for use next year.

The World Health Organization said it hopes tens of thousands of people in Africa, including front-line healthcare workers, can start receiving vaccines beginning in January.

U.S. company Johnson & Johnson said it aims to produce at least 1 million doses of its two-step vaccine next year and has already discussed collaboration with Britain's GlaxoSmithKline, which is working on a rival vaccine.

Human testing of a second "investigational" Ebola vaccine is under way at the U.S. National Institutes of Health's Clinical Center in Maryland, the NIH said on Wednesday. Testing on a first possible vaccine began last month, and initial data was expected by the end of the year.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the need for a vaccine against Ebola is urgent and this vaccine, called VSV-ZEBOV, is promising.

It was developed at the Public Health Agency of Canada's National Microbiology Laboratory and licensed to NewLink Genetics Corp through its wholly owned subsidiary BioProtection Systems, both based in Ames, Iowa, the NIH said.

NBC freelance cameraman Ashoka Mukpo, an American who contracted Ebola while working in West Africa, is free of the virus and was discharged on Wednesday from a special unit at Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, the hospital said.

"After enduring weeks where it was unclear whether I would survive, I'm walking out of the hospital on my own power, free from Ebola," Mukpo said in a statement.

"I feel profoundly blessed to be alive, and in the same breath aware of the global inequalities that allowed me to be flown to an American hospital when so many Liberians die alone with minimal care," Mukpo added.

(Additional reporting by Ben Hirschler in London, Will Dunham and Susan Heavey in Washington, Barbara Goldberg in New York, Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago and David Bailey in Minneapolis; Writing by Will Dunham; Editing by Michele Gershberg, Grant McCool and Jonathan Oatis)

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TOP NEWS Canada's parliament attacked near where PM Harper was speaking

By Randall Palmer and David Ljunggren

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada's capital was jolted on Wednesday by the fatal shooting of a soldier and an attack on the parliament building in which gunshots were fired outside a room where Prime Minister Stephen Harper was speaking.

The gunman in the parliament building was shot dead, and Harper was safely removed.

Canadian police said they could not "at this point" confirm whether the man who shot dead the soldier, who was guarding the National War Memorial in central Ottawa, was the same person who shortly afterwards attacked the nearby the parliament building.

Witnesses said at least 30 shots were fired after a gunman entered the parliament building and was pursued by police.

The assault came very near the room where Harper was meeting with members of his Conservative party, a government minister said.

"PM (Harper) was addressing caucus, then a huge boom, followed by rat-a-tat shots. We all scattered. It was clearly right outside our caucus door," Treasury Board Minister Tony Clement told Reuters.

The incident, shocking in Canada's normally tranquil capital, was not over.

Parliament and buildings in downtown remained on lockdown.

Harper stressed that government and parliament should continue its work, a spokesman said. "While the prime minister stated that facts are still being gathered, he condemned this despicable attack," the spokesman said.

Police said that an operation was under way to make parliament safe and they were still in the middle of an active investigation.

"It caught us by surprise... If we had known that this was coming, we would have been able to disrupt it," Gilles Michaud, assistant commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, (RCMP) told a news conference.

GUNS DRAWN IN PARLIAMENT

Dramatic video footage posted by the Globe and Mail newspaper showed police with guns drawn inside the main parliament building. At least a dozen loud bangs can be heard on the clip, echoing through the hallway.

Veterans Affairs Minister Julian Fantino, a former policeman, told the Toronto Sun that parliament's head of security, Sergeant-at-Arms Kevin Vickers, shot dead a suspected gunman.

"All the details are not in, but the sergeant-at-arms, a former Mountie, is the one that engaged the gunman, or one of them at least, and stopped this," Fantino said.

Canadian cabinet minister Jason Kenney said a guard in parliament buildings was also wounded in the incident.

There was no word yet on the identity of any suspect or suspects. It was also unclear whether there was any connection to an attack on Monday when an Islamic convert ran down two Canadian soldiers with his car, killing one, near Montreal, before being shot dead by police in the first fatal attack on Canadian soil tied to Islamic militants.

Canada announced this month it was joining the battle against Islamic State fighters who have taken over parts of Iraq and Syria.

Canada said on Tuesday it had raised the national terrorism threat level to medium from low because of a rise in "general chatter" from radical groups such as Islamic State and al Qaeda but said there had not been a specific threat.

The RCMP's Michaud said the threat level on Parliament Hill had been on medium for some time.

No group, Islamic or otherwise, claimed responsibility for either the attack in Ottawa or the one near Montreal. Monday's attacker, 25-year-old Martin Rouleau, who converted to Islam last year, was among 90 people being tracked by the RCMP on suspicion of taking part in militant activities abroad or planning to do so.

POLICE FLOOD STREETS

As the drama in Ottawa unfolded, police in dark bulletproof vests and carrying automatic rifles flooded the streets near parliament.

Some took cover behind vehicles and shouted to people to clear the area, saying: "We do not have the suspect in custody. You are in danger here."

Police quickly cleared several blocks of downtown Ottawa.

Several police cars were parked on the lawns outside the parliament buildings. Small groups of police could be seen sheltering behind at least two cars.

Members of parliament were told to lock or barricade themselves in their offices, and stay away from the windows.

At the time of the shooting, the opposition New Democrats were holding their weekly caucus meeting. A tweeted picture sent from the room showed a pile of chairs jammed up against the main door to prevent anyone from entering.

The soldier who died in the shooting was taken into an ambulance in which medical personnel could be seen giving him cardio-pulmonary resuscitation. Authorities did not identify him and it was not clear if he was armed or not when he was shot.

CBC News reported that he was a reservist who had been serving in Hamilton, Ontario.

'DOUBLE-BARRELED SHOTGUN'

In Washington, a White House official said U.S. President Barack Obama had been briefed on the situation. He said the United States had offered assistance to Canada.

Mass shootings are relatively rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and the regulations at one point included a national registry of rifles and shotguns. Legislation was passed in 2012 to scrap the registry.

Ottawa has a low murder rate. There were nine homicides in 2013 and seven in 2012, in a city of 885,000 people. Compared with Capitol Hill in Washington, security on Parliament Hill is also fairly low key. Anybody could walk right up to the front door of parliament's Centre Block with arms and explosives without being challenged before entering the front door, where a few guards check accreditation.

Centre Block is the main building on Parliament Hill, a sprawling complex of buildings and open space in downtown Ottawa. It contains the House of Commons and Senate chambers as well as the offices of some members of parliament, senators, and senior administration for both legislative houses.

A construction worker who was on the scene in Ottawa when the shooting began told Reuters he heard a gunshot, and then saw a man with a scarf over his face running towards parliament.

"He was wearing blue pants and a black jacket and he had a double barreled shotgun and he ran up the side of this building here and hijacked a car at gunpoint," construction worker Scott Walsh told Reuters.

The driver got out safely, then the man drove the car to the Centre Block, where construction work is underway, Walsh said.

The Canadian military closed its bases across the country to the public following the events in Ottawa, CBC TV said.

Canadian and U.S. stock markets declined after the shootings in Ottawa. The Toronto Stock Exchange's TSX index (.GSPTSE) dropped 1.6 percent, while the S&P 500 (.SPX) gave back 0.7 percent.

The attacks in Ottawa and in Quebec took place as the Canadian government prepared to boost the powers of its spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Public Safety Minister Stephen Blaney said last Thursday the new legislation would let the agency track and investigate potential terrorists when they travel abroad and ultimately prosecute them.

(Additional reporting by Allison Martell and Andrea Hopkins in Toronto; Jeff Mason and Steve Holland in Washington; Writing by Frances Kerry; Editing by Amran Abocar; and Peter Galloway)

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TECHNOLOGY NEWS: Big Tech winning battle with 'patent trolls'

By Andrew Chung and Dan Levine

(Reuters) - For two decades, companies that buy software patents to sue technology giants have been the scourge of Silicon Valley. Reviled as patent trolls, they have attacked everything from Google's online ads to Apple's iPhone features, sometimes winning hundreds of millions of dollars.

But now the trolls are in retreat from the tech titans, interviews and data reviewed by Reuters show.

In the wake of several changes in U.S. law, which make it easier to challenge software patents, patent prices are plummeting, the number of court fights is down, and stock prices of many patent-holding companies have fallen. Some tech firms say they are punching up research budgets as legal costs shrink, while support for major patent reform is under fire as trolls get trounced.

"Their entire business model relies on intimidation, and that has lost its edge," said Efrat Kasznik, president of intellectual property consulting firm Foresight Valuation Group. "If the patents are not enforceable in court anymore... the troll has no legs to stand on."

Brokers who work with the patent acquisition companies acknowledge the new climate.

"In some cases, there are just no current buyers for these patents at all," said Robert Aronoff, founder of the patent brokerage Pluritas, citing new legal standards for the change.

NetApp, a Silicon Valley maker of sophisticated data storage devices, last month used a new legal precedent to force a patent holder to pay its legal fees. The judge called the case "reckless and wasteful."

The new playing field allows NetApp to spend more on developing its own patents, as opposed to litigation defense. "It is freeing up dollars," said Douglas Luftman, NetApp's chief intellectual property counsel.

To be sure, not all litigious patent owning companies are losing ground. Some with court-tested patents are doing well. And not all big tech companies are convinced of the change.

Cisco Systems Inc (CSCO.O) has been at the forefront of the fight against infringement lawsuits and has not seen a drop in new suits in recent months, said General Counsel Mark Chandler.

Cisco will continue to push for laws to stop warrantless lawsuits, Chandler said. Others see the need diminishing.

THE BIRTH OF TROLLS

Big tech companies distinguish between their own intellectual property, which they fiercely protect, and those of their adversaries, which they often dismiss as broadly worded and vague, allowing holders to sue all manner of defendants. The big tech companies note that the patent acquisition companies they label as trolls generally make no products but are solely in the business of buying patents and litigating to enforce them.

The putative trolls see a different world. They buy patents from inventors and each other, creating a marketplace that checks big tech companies' sway, and rely ultimately on a fair arbiter: courts. This can provide vital protection for investors' ideas, said Matt Vella, CEO of Acacia Research Corp, which contracts with owners to license their patents to other companies. "I see it as a Robin Hood function," he said.

If the so-called trolls had a birth date, it would be the summer of 1994, when a federal appeals court explicitly allowed computer program patents for the first time.

In the ensuing years, software patents exploded, covering topics from Wi-Fi to one-click shopping. So did patent lawsuits. Last year, more than 6,000 patent suits were filed, according to intellectual property analytics firm Lex Machina. A 2013 White House report said "trolls" were responsible for 60 percent of suits, up from 29 percent in 2010.

Congress struck the first blow against these high-volume plaintiffs in an overhaul of the patent system. Starting in 2012, companies accused of infringement could ask the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to invalidate patents used in litigation. The reviews are much cheaper and faster than court.

The reviews proved popular -- and devastating for many patent owners. As of June, the patent office was invalidating some or all of challenged patents' claims at a rate of 80 to 90 percent, depending on the type of review.

Then, in June of this year, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that a basic idea -- not normally eligible for a patent -- does not become patent-worthy if run on a computer. That case, Alice vs. CLS Bank, has made it easier still to quash software patents, and at least 13 lower court rulings since then have done just that.

MOUNTING EVIDENCE

New federal patent lawsuits last month were down 40 percent from the previous year, to 329 cases, data from Lex Machina show.

Defendants are also fighting longer, driving up costs for the acquisition companies. In 2004, the median time it took for a case that didn't settle was 467 days. By 2013, that had reached 673 days, according to Lex Machina.

Intellectual Ventures, one of the largest private patent buyers, laid off over 20 percent of its workforce this year. The company began with backing from big tech companies who saw it as an ally, but some longtime investors including Apple and Intel declined to participate in its latest funding round. Intellectual Ventures declined to comment.

A survey of private patent deals compiled by brokerage IPOfferings, found the average price of a patent was $165,000 in the second quarter of 2014, down from $375,000 in 2012.

Some patents have withstood challenges under the new legal rules, however. Marathon Patent Group(MARA.O) announced last month that the U.S. government rejected a request by ARM Holdings to invalidate a Marathon patent. Marathon is trading up 28 percent since mid-June.

Michael Friedman, managing director at IP strategy firm Ocean Tomo, said patents on widely used technology owned by companies like IBM, Microsoft and Qualcomm, are still in a strong position to seek licenses.

But some companies whose business model depends on successful litigation have seen their stock slide since Alice, the 2014 Supreme Court case. InterDigital (IDCC.O) has fallen over 5 percent and Acacia Research Corp (ACTG.O) is down over 9 percent. (See graphic: http://link.reuters.com/rej23w)

Just three weeks after Alice was decided, an Acacia Research subsidiary felt its reach when a federal appeals court backed the revocation of a patent on digital image processing, used to sue over 30 tech firms.

Acacia is appealing and said that in general, its other patents will not be impacted by Alice in the same way, since few deal with the kinds of software methods Alice puts at risk.

Still, Vella, Acacia's CEO, said, said his company sensed the changing legal landscape and is shifting its strategy, away from one-patent cases to challenges based on several patents.

(Additional reporting by Diane Bartz in Washington)

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TECHNOLOGY NEWS: Apple CEO discusses security with top Chinese official amid hacking claims: Xinhua

BEIJING (Reuters) - Apple Inc (AAPL.O) Chief Executive Tim Cook discussed user data security at a meeting on Wednesday with a top Chinese government official in Beijing, the official Xinhua news agency reported.



The meeting comes days after a Chinese web monitoring group published a report saying Apple users in China have been targeted in a sophisticated and widespread attack by hackers seeking private user data stored on the iCloud service.



The group, Greatfire.org, has alleged Chinese government involvement in the hack, a claim the government has strongly refuted. Apple has not issued any public statements on the matter.



At a meeting on Wednesday in Zhongnanhai, the Beijing complex housing China's central government, Cook and Vice Premier Ma Kai exchanged views on "protection of users' information" as well as "strengthening cooperation and in information and communication fields," according to Xinhua.



Greatfire told Reuters that Apple appeared to have rerouted user data on Tuesday to circumvent the hack.



The company did not respond to requests for comment Wednesday.



(Reporting by Gerry Shih)





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TECHNOLOGY NEWS: EMC to buy much of Cisco's stake in joint venture VCE

(Reuters) - Data storage products maker EMC Corp said it will buy much of Cisco System Inc's stake in their joint venture VCE for an undisclosed sum.



VCE, set up in 2009 as a one-stop shop for data centers, bundles Cisco's networking equipment and servers with EMC's storage gear and software from EMC's virtualization software unit VMware Inc.



Reports of EMC and Cisco encroaching on each other's turfs had sparked speculation that the partnership was fraying. Cisco, which had a 35 percent stake in the joint venture, will retain a 10 percent stake in VCE.



EMC said it will merge VCE into its business, but this will have no impact on its 2014 results.



"We view the Cisco/VCE news as a 'yawner' given that EMC right now is facing a plethora of growth and strategic challenges and the last thing on investors' minds is the future of VCE," FBR Capital Markets analyst Daniel Ives wrote in a note to clients.



Activist investor Elliott Management has been pushing hard for EMC to pursue merger or spinoff opportunities.



Paul Singer, another activist investor, asked the company earlier this month to separate its VMware subsidiary.



EMC, which cut its full-year profit forecast on Wednesday, had contributed $1.26 billion in funding to VCE since inception and owned about 58 percent of the joint venture as of June 30.



EMC's plan to buy Cisco's stake in VCE was first reported by Bloomberg on Tuesday.



(Reporting By Kanika Sikka and Supantha Mukherjee in Bangalore; Editing by Feroze Jamal)





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TECHNOLOGY NEWS: Lufthansa close to deal with IBM for IT infrastructure unit

BERLIN/FRANKFURT (Reuters) - German airline Lufthansa (LHAG.DE) is close to a deal to sell its IT infrastructure unit to IBM (IBM.N), including an outsourcing agreement for the services, as part of a shake-up of its technology activities, it said on Wednesday.

Europe's largest airline by revenue is undergoing restructuring and cost-cutting efforts to better position itself to compete with low-cost carriers and Gulf rivals.

It earlier this year said it was seeking a buyer for the unit, which provides data centers, networks and telephony, because it requires a high level of investment and economies of scale, which the airline could not provide.

Under the planned deal, Lufthansa will outsource all of its IT infrastructure services to IBM under a seven-year deal and the U.S. firm will take over the airline's IT infrastructure division, currently part of Lufthansa Systems.

The partnership announcement comes two days after IBM, a company undergoing a stark transition of its own, shocked the markets with lower quarterly results and by suspending its full-year forecasts.

IBM, now largely a computer services supplier, said it suffered a marked slowdown in September as many customers stopped buying new services due in part to macroeconomic concerns but also the rapid pace of changing client demand for the latest technologies delivered as Internet-based services.

Lufthansa shares rose 2.6 percent in early trading, the top gainer among German blue-chips (.GDAXI), as analysts welcomed the progress in the restructuring of the division,

The deal will result in a one-off pre-tax charge of 240 million euros for Lufthansa, which will not impact its operating result for 2014. It will allow Lufthansa to reduce its annual IT costs by around 70 million euros a year.

A final price for the sale is still being negotiated, a spokeswoman told Reuters.

The sale is part of plans to reorganize the Lufthansa Systems business into three parts - Infrastructure, Airline Solutions and Industry Solutions, with the latter two to be kept within the Lufthansa group as independent companies.

The infrastructure business, which employs 1,400 people, accounted for 40 percent of Systems' total turnover of 640 million euros ($883.45 million) in 2013 but it made up only 25 percent of the unit's profit.

The Lufthansa Systems restructuring is expected to be complete in the first quarter of 2015, with the deal to sell the IT infrastructure unit due to complete by March 31, 2015.

Other parties reportedly interested in the unit were Hewlett-Packard (HPQ.N) and France's Atos (ATOS.PA).

(Reporting by Victoria Bryan, Harro ten Wolde and Eric Auchard; Editing by Thomas Atkins)

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HEALTHCARE NEWS: Cuban doctors arrive in Liberia to fight Ebola alongside U.S. troops

By James Harding Giahyue

MONROVIA (Reuters) - A plane carrying some 50 Cuban doctors and nurses arrived in Liberia on Wednesday to help treat victims of Ebola in the West African country, where a U.S. military mission is also deploying to fight the deadly virus.

An Air Cubana jet carrying the 51 medical staff touched down at Monrovia's Roberts International Airport. Another group of around 40 doctors from the communist-led Caribbean island were due to arrive in neighboring Guinea on Wednesday.

A top Cuban health official has voiced hope that collaboration in fighting Ebola could help thaw relations between Cuba and the United States, long-time adversaries.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry singled out the Cuban effort in West Africa for praise last week.  

Cuba is sending the largest medical contingent to West Africa from any country in the world. Cuban authorities have trained 461 doctors and nurses but so far only 256 have been sent on missions, which are scheduled to last six months.

The first group of 165 doctors and nurses deployed to Sierra Leone at the start of October. The final 205 medical staff remain in Cuba awaiting an assignment which will depend on funding from the United Nations, an invitation from the host countries and suitable infrastructure on the ground as determined by the World Health Organization.

The United States is sending 3,000 military engineers, medical personnel and other troops to the region to build Ebola Treatment Units and help train local medical staff to use them.

The communist-led Caribbean island has sent medical brigades to disaster sites around the world since the 1959 revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power. Cuban and U.S. personnel have worked together before, notably after the Haitian earthquake in 2010.  

Besides medical diplomacy, Cuba sends doctors overseas in exchange for money or goods, notably Venezuelan oil, making professional services a top export earner. More than 50,000 Cuban medical personnel are posted in 66 countries.

Nicknamed as the "army of white robes", and citing a long history of Cuban medical missions in Africa and elsewhere, the doctors told Reuters in Havana before deploying that they felt a sense of duty to fight Ebola and were willing to assume the risks.

(Additional reporting by Daniel Trotta in Havana; Writing by Daniel Flynn; Editing by David Lewis)

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TOP NEWS Factbox: Who's who on the new EU executive

(Reuters) - The European Parliament votes on Wednesday in Strasbourg on whether to confirm in office the new European Commission, the EU executive to be led by Jean-Claude Juncker.

Each of the 28 member states nominates a commissioner. All have passed individual confirmation hearings in the legislature.

The line-up proposed by Juncker is as follows:

PRESIDENT JEAN-CLAUDE JUNCKER

Luxembourg, center-right, 59. Prime minister for 19 years. Confirmed in office by parliament after nomination by national leaders in July over strong British objections. He wants to centralize power but promises a "political not technocratic" Commission focused on reviving the economy and regaining trust of voters who backed a host of anti-EU parties in the European Parliament election in May.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS CHIEF FEDERICA MOGHERINI

Italy, center-left, 41. Nominated by EU governments despite reservations in Eastern Europe that she is soft on Russia, a key gas supplier for Italy. Promises youthful energy, to hold Moscow to account over Ukraine and to engage with Iran and the Arab world. At a confident hearing, she said the EU should "deeply reassess" relations with Russia in the coming five years.

FIRST VICE-PRESIDENT FRANS TIMMERMANS

Netherlands, center-left, 53. Juncker's "right hand" with a roving brief to keep order in the new, two-tier hierarchy, charged with delivering Juncker's promises. Former diplomat, foreign minister, prodigious linguist, including Russian learned on military service. He has been asked to foster sustainable development across his brief to ease environmentalists' concerns about the new energy and climate change commissioner.

VICE-PRESIDENT, BUDGET, KRISTALINA GEORGIEVA

Bulgaria, center-right, 61. Former World Bank economist, ran humanitarian affairs in outgoing Commission after last-minute nomination prompted by parliament's rejection of Sofia's first choice. Seen across party spectrum as a competent performer.

VICE-PRESIDENT, ENERGY UNION, MAROS SEFCOVIC

Slovakia, center-left, 48. Outgoing commissioner responsible for EU institutions. Former diplomat in Brussels and Israel, a graduate of Soviet, French and U.S. universities. Originally offered the transport brief, he was given this more senior post after lawmakers rejected Slovenia's Alenka Bratusek in the role.

VICE-PRESIDENT, JOBS & GROWTH, JYRKI KATAINEN

Finland, center-right, 42. Prime minister until June and outgoing EU economy commissioner, he's a fiscal hawk in the euro zone, close to German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Will oversee Moscovici, who hopes to take over his economics portfolio, as well as Hill, Thyssen, Bienkowska, Cretu and others.

VICE-PRESIDENT, EURO & SOCIAL DIALOGUE, VALDIS DOMBROVSKIS

Latvia, center-right, 43. Physicist turned bank economist, finance minister and, until January, the prime minister who kept power despite the deep economic pain required to enable the Baltic state to join the euro zone. Resigned over deadly collapse of a Riga supermarket building. Another fiscal hawk, he would also oversee commissioners Moscovici, Hill and Thyssen.

VICE-PRESIDENT, DIGITAL SINGLE MARKET, ANDRUS ANSIP

Estonia, centrist, 58. Qualified chemist and former Soviet Communist party member, he was prime minister for nine years until stepping down in May, retaining popularity despite hardships of qualifying for using the euro in 2011. An advocate of Estonia's high-tech approach to development, he has been a critic of Russian expansionism. At hearing, criticized "cherry picking" of EU tax regimes by global technology companies.

COMMISSIONER, JUSTICE, CONSUMERS & GENDER, VERA JOUROVA

Czech, centrist, 50. Has been regional development minister. From ANO movement of billionaire Finance Minister Andrej Babis. Cleared and compensated after spending month in custody in 2006 over allegation she misused EU funds when in government. Center-left demanded she answer more written questions after hearing.

COMMISSIONER, DIGITAL ECONOMY, GUENTHER OETTINGER

Germany, center-right, 60. Combative outgoing energy commissioner, still deeply involved in trying to broker Russia-Ukraine gas deal. Was state premier in wealthy Baden-Wuerttemberg. Low-key post for EU's big power, but Berlin is keen to see data protection strengthened globally. At hearing, he stressed he would bring forward proposals to reform copyright rules and work to ensure rules protecting net neutrality are not watered down by the governments discussing them.

COMMISSIONER, ECONOMIC AFFAIRS, PIERRE MOSCOVICI

France, center-left, 57. Moderate socialist from France's technocratic elite, son of prominent Romanian and Polish refugee psychologists. Europe minister 1997-2002. Finance minister under President Francois Hollande from 2012, he was denounced as "not credible" by the center-right at hearing, despite his assurances he would impose EU deficit discipline on Paris as on any state. He was obliged to submit a second round of written testimony in which he said he was ready to fine France for missing targets.

COMMISSIONER, EMPLOYMENT, MARIANNE THYSSEN

Belgium, center-right, 58. Long-time member of the European Parliament and former leader of Flemish Christian Democrats.

COMMISSIONER, REGIONAL POLICY, CORINA CRETU

Romania, center-left, 47. Former spokeswoman for President Ion Iliescu, later member of Romanian and then EU parliament.

COMMISSIONER, NEIGHBORHOOD & ENLARGEMENT, JOHANNES HAHN

Austria, center-right, 56. Outgoing regional commissioner and former CEO of gaming equipment manufacturer. May have a role in Ukraine crisis, although no new EU members seen joining in the five years of the Juncker commission's mandate.

COMMISSIONER, MIGRATION, HOME AFFAIRS, DIMITRIS AVRAMOPOULOS

Greece, center-right, 61. Defense minister since 2013. Has also been Athens mayor and foreign minister. Greece is on the frontline of many EU efforts to stem illegal migration from Middle East. He told his hearing he supported outreach to asylum seekers and also reinforcing border security in Mediterranean. Will also oversee "citizenship" brief after parliament objected to Hungary's Navracsics having broad civil rights portfolio.

COMMISSIONER, HEALTH & FOOD SAFETY, VYTENIS ANDRIUKAITIS

Lithuania, center-left, 63. Heart surgeon, born in Siberia to parents deported by Stalin, he was a long-time dissident. Cleared of corruption allegations that saw him quit parliament in 2004. Told hearing he would not let a U.S. trade deal force the EU to accept "chlorine chicken."

COMMISSIONER, FINANCIAL SERVICES, JONATHAN HILL

Britain, conservative, 54. Aide to premier John Major in 1990s. He founded a lobbying firm. As leader of David Cameron's party in unelected upper house, he had a low profile. Cameron, who tried to block Juncker's appointment, hailed the nomination of Hill to a brief vital to London's business interests. Charmed lawmakers personally, but left them demanding he "resit" hearing to show more grasp of substance.

COMMISSIONER, INTERNAL MARKET, INDUSTRY, ELZBIETA BIENKOWSKA

Poland, center-right, 50. Deputy premier for regions under Prime Minister Donald Tusk, the incoming European Council chief. Will also run space policy, moved out of transport commission.

COMMISSIONER, CLIMATE ACTION & ENERGY, MIGUEL ARIAS CANETE

Spain, center-right, 64. Left and greens quizzed him hard on family ties to oil industry they said were a conflict of interest in this portfolio. Center-left eventually backed him, to the fury of the Greens, after Juncker gave Timmermans watching brief over "sustainable development".

COMMISSIONER, INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, NEVEN MIMICA

Croatia, center-left, 61 next week. Named commissioner for consumer protection when Croatia joined the EU last year. A veteran of foreign and trade issues and a doctor in economics. Questioned on Monday, he said the EU should be more active in promoting development through aid, be "a player, not a payer."

COMMISSIONER, COMPETITION, MARGRETHE VESTAGER

Denmark, centrist, 46. Won widespread respect in EU as Copenhagen's economy minister. Has vowed not to be bullied by EU governments or big business as she takes on the powerful post.

COMMISSIONER, TRANSPORT, VIOLETA BULC

Slovenia, centrist, 50. Trained in San Francisco and after working in Silicon Valley, she returned to Slovenia to the state telecommunications company and then founded her own firm, Telemach. A basketball star in her youth, she has a black belt in taekwondo and taught self-defense. Studied as a shaman and offers fire-walking training in the business consultancy she runs. Passed a fast-track confirmation hearing only on Monday.

COMMISSIONER, TRADE, CECILIA MALMSTROM

Sweden, centrist, 46. Outgoing home affairs commissioner. Former minister and EU parliamentarian. Quizzed on Monday, she sought to assure lawmakers that U.S. multinationals would not be able to use a free-trade deal to force EU states to weaken consumer and other protections [ID:nL6N0RU33W] and said Russia could not amend an EU-Ukraine pact.

COMMISSIONER, ENVIRONMENT & FISHERIES, KARMENU VELLA

Malta, center-left, 64. Architect, civil engineer and veteran minister, including tourism. At the hearing, Vella was pressed on Malta's failure to protect migratory birds from hunters and pledged to enforce EU rules on all governments.

COMMISSIONER, EDUCATION & CULTURE, TIBOR NAVRACSICS

Hungary, center-right, 48. As justice minister under premier Viktor Orban, he oversaw new laws, including media rules, that some lawmakers say were anti-democratic and make him unsuitable. In answers to further written questions, he distanced himself from the government, but the committee voted to reject him for this post, saying he should be reassigned. Keeps most of his portfolio, but stripped of the citizenship brief.

COMMISSIONER, RESEARCH & SCIENCE, CARLOS MOEDAS

Portugal, center-right, 44. Worked as a civil engineer in France before a Harvard MBA led to M&A role at Goldman Sachs. He founded his own investment company and was a negotiator with the EU, IMF and ECB on Lisbon's bailout program.

COMMISSIONER, AGRICULTURE, PHIL HOGAN

Ireland, center-right, 54. A former teacher and auctioneer, he has served 25 years in Ireland's parliament, latterly as environment minister. Won strong cross-party support after hearing.

COMMISSIONER, AID & CRISIS MANAGEMENT, CHRISTOS STYLIANIDES

Cyprus, center-right, 56. Former government spokesman. He impressed many lawmakers at his hearing.

(Writing by Alastair Macdonald; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)

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TOP NEWS: EU okays new executive as Juncker vows to seize 'Europe's last chance'

By Gilbert Reilhac

STRASBOURG France (Reuters) - The European Union will have a new executive in place next month led by Jean-Claude Juncker following its approval in a vote by the European Parliament on Wednesday.

Addressing the chamber before his European Commission was approved by 423 votes to 209, the former Luxembourg premier warned that voters were losing patience with EU bureaucracy and a failure to create prosperity. He promised a major plan for new investment within two months of him taking office on Nov. 1.

"Citizens are losing faith," he said in remarks to an assembly to which many new Euroskeptic members were elected in May. "Extremists on the left and right are nipping at our heels.

"We are last-chance Europe. Let's seize this chance."

After a rough ride in parliamentary confirmation hearings for some of the 28 commissioners, one nominated by each member state, Juncker made only one change to his original line-up and had no concerns going into the vote, given support from his own center-right bloc and from the main center-left party.

That "grand coalition", also supported by the centrists, brought opposition from other parties, including the Greens, and an array of Euroskeptics, including French National Front leader Marine Le Pen and UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage, both of whom sharply criticized Juncker during the debate.

Juncker, 59, told parliament he would present details of his previously promised 300-billion-euro ($380-billion) plan for investment to bolster growth and jobs by the end of this year but also, in a nod to his conservative ally German Chancellor Angela Merkel, stressed governments must keep deficits down.

Switching from French to speak in German, he said investment was vital to restoring growth and creating jobs; Berlin is resisting calls from deficit-strapped France and Italy for it to spend more to kick-start growth in the stuttering euro zone.

Juncker stressed, however, that, as Merkel has said, much of the 300 billion euros should come from private investors and that the EU's budget rules that limit the size of government deficits and public debt will not be weakened.

"The rules will not be changed," Juncker said. "But they can be implemented with a degree flexibility."

Investment, he said, was only one part of a three-pillar strategy, along with structural reforms of national economic policy and renewed fiscal credibility for governments.

BRITISH SKEPTICS

British Prime Minister David Cameron's Conservatives declared they would abstain in the vote. Cameron had tried in vain to block Juncker's appointment by EU leaders. He said he was too much a veteran of Brussels backroom dealing to make reforms to the bloc that the British premier says are necessary before Britons vote in a referendum on whether to quit the EU.

An EU source said Juncker was disappointed by the abstention: "London failed to honor their part of the deal," the source said, referring to Juncker's appointment of Cameron ally Jonathan Hill as financial services commissioner - a move that provoked widespread opposition in other countries.

A spokesman for the Conservative-led bloc in parliament said there had been no "deal" and that the decision to abstain was based on an assessment of the commissioners in their hearings.

Asked at a news conference after the vote about British doubts over his ability to reform the EU as London wants, Juncker repeated his willingness to work to keep Britain in the bloc: "We want a fair deal with Britain," he said.

Riding high in opinion polls ahead of a British election next spring, Farage however told Juncker that his EU executive was "the enemy of the very concept of democracy" and forecast that his would be the last commission to "govern Britain".

PRIORITIES

Juncker pledged a "very political" team, not "a bunch of anonymous technocrats", that would focus during its five-year mandate on carrying out major programs while leaving other matters to national governments.

He said a new, two-tier hierarchy Commission whose number has soared with the expansion of the EU to 28 member states, was designed to make it more efficient and to break down "parochial attitudes" in which commissioners pursued individual projects. A new layer of vice-presidents would coordinate them.

Juncker and his team will take over on Nov. 1 from the executive led for the past 10 years by the former Portuguese prime minister Jose Manuel Barroso.

Among major figures will be French former finance minister Pierre Moscovici, the economy commissioner, whose appointment was met with questions from Germany and conservatives elsewhere due to the Socialist's part in a government in Paris that has failed to meet EU targets for cutting its deficits.

Moscovici will, however, share responsibility for upholding EU policy on the euro and budgets with austerity hawks Jyrki Katainen and Valdis Dombrovskis, Commision vice-presidents and former premiers of Finland and Latvia respectively.

The new EU foreign affairs chief will be Italy's Federica Mogherini while the powerful antitrust commissioner will be Margrethe Vestager of Denmark.

Juncker's "right hand" will be Frans Timmermans, the center-left former Dutch foreign minister. Among other tasks, he is to ensure a planned free-trade deal with the United States does not give too much power to multinational companies.

(Additional reporting by Robin Emmott, Alastair Macdonald and Jan Strupczewski; Writing by Alastair Macdonald; Editing by Louise Ireland)

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TOP NEWS U.S. government probes medical devices for possible cyber flaws

By Jim Finkle

BOSTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is investigating about two dozen cases of suspected cybersecurity flaws in medical devices and hospital equipment that officials fear could be exploited by hackers, a senior official at the agency told Reuters.

The products under review by the agency's Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team, or ICS-CERT, include an infusion pump from Hospira Inc and implantable heart devices from Medtronic Inc and St Jude Medical Inc, according to other people familiar with the cases, who asked not to be identified because the probes are confidential.

These people said they do not know of any instances of hackers attacking patients through these devices, so the cyber threat should not be overstated. Still, the agency is concerned that malicious actors may try to gain control of the devices remotely and create problems, such as instructing an infusion pump to overdose a patient with drugs, or forcing a heart implant to deliver a deadly jolt of electricity, the sources said.

The senior DHS official said the agency is working with manufacturers to identify and repair software coding bugs and other vulnerabilities that hackers can potentially use to expose confidential data or attack hospital equipment. He declined to name the companies.

"These are the things that shows like 'Homeland' are built from," said the official, referring to the U.S. television spy drama in which the fictional vice president of the United States is killed by a cyber attack on his pacemaker.

"It isn't out of the realm of the possible to cause severe injury or death," said the official, who did not want to be identified due to the sensitive nature of his work.

Hospira, Medtronic and St Jude Medical declined to comment on the DHS investigations. All three companies said they take cybersecurity seriously and have made changes to improve product safety, but declined to give details.

CONNECTED DEVICES

ICS-CERT's mandate is to help protect critical U.S. infrastructure from cyber threats, whether they are introduced through human error, virus infections, or through attacks by criminals or extremists.

According to the senior DHS official, the agency started examining healthcare equipment about two years ago, when cybersecurity researchers were becoming more interested in medical devices that increasingly contained computer chips, software, wireless technology and Internet connectivity, making them more susceptible to hacking.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which regulates the sale of medical devices, recently released guidelines for manufacturers and healthcare providers to better secure medical devices and is holding its first public conference on the topic this week.

"The conventional wisdom in the past was that products only had to be protected from unintentional threats. Now they also have to be protected from intentional threats too," said William Maisel, chief scientist at the FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health. He declined to comment on the DHS reviews.

The senior DHS official said the two dozen cases currently under investigation cover a wide range of equipment, including medical imaging equipment and hospital networking systems. A DHS review does not imply the government thinks a company has done anything wrong - it means the agency is looking into a suspected vulnerability to try to help rectify it.

One of the cases involves an alleged vulnerability in a type of infusion pump, a piece of hospital equipment that delivers medication directly into a patient's bloodstream. Private cybersecurity researcher Billy Rios said he discovered the alleged bug but declined to identify the manufacturer of the pump. Two people familiar with his research said the manufacturer was Hospira.

    Rios said he wrote a program that could remotely force multiple pumps to dose patients with potentially lethal amounts of drugs. He submitted his analysis to the DHS.

    "This is a issue that is going to be extremely difficult to patch," said Rios, a former Marine platoon commander who has worked for several Silicon Valley technology firms and recently founded security startup Laconicly.

    Reuters was not able to independently review his research or identify the type of pump Rios studied from Hospira's line, which includes multiple models.

Hospira spokeswoman Tareta Adams, while declining to comment on specifics, said the company is working to improve the security of its products.

"Hospira has implemented software adjustments, distributed customer communications and made a commitment to evaluate other changes going forward, while ensuring we are not adversely impacting the ability of our devices to meet hospital and patient needs, and maintain compliance with FDA product requirements," Adams said in the statement.

MORE AWARENESS

Hospital security officers say there is increasing awareness about cyber threats, and medical centers around the country have been shoring up networks to better defend against hackers.

At the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, all medical devices will soon need to be tested to make sure they meet security standards before they can be put on the hospital's network, according to Lessley Stoltenberg, the center's chief information security officer.

"I'm pretty concerned," said Stoltenberg. "Coming out of the block, medical devices don't really have security built into them."

The DHS is also reviewing suspected vulnerabilities in implantable heart devices from Medtronic and St Jude Medical, according to two people familiar with the matter.

They said the probe was based in part on research by Barnaby Jack, a well-known hacker who died in July 2013. Jack had said he could hack into wireless communications systems that link implanted pacemakers and defibrillators with bedside monitors.

Medtronic spokeswoman Marie Yarroll said in an email that the company has "made changes to enhance the security" of its implantable cardiac devices, but declined to give specifics "in the interest of patient safety."

St. Jude Medical spokeswoman Candace Steele Flippin also declined to discuss specific products but said the company has "an ongoing program to perform extensive security testing on our medical devices and networked equipment. If a risk is identified, we will issue patches for any known issues."

CHENEY'S DEFIBRILLATOR

Experts said it is important that security vulnerabilities in medical devices are exposed so manufacturers can fix them, but many said there was no need for patients to panic.

"It's very easy to sort of sensationalize these problems," said Kevin Fu, who runs the Archimedes Research Center for Medical Device Security at the University of Michigan.

Still, worries about cybersecurity have made some individuals wary of medical devices with wireless and Internet connections.

In 2007, then-U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney ordered some of the wireless features to be disabled on his defibrillator due to security concerns. When asked if he would recommend other patients do the same, Cheney said not necessarily.

"You've got to look at all eventualities and do whatever you have to safeguard the capabilities of the individual," Cheney told Reuters on Tuesday. "In terms of how it would affect others, I think the president and vice president are in relatively unique circumstances."

Cyber researcher Jay Radcliffe used to be among the hundreds of thousands of diabetics relying on computerized insulin pumps. He said he stopped using his Medtronic pump after he found that he could hack into its wireless communications system and potentially dump fatal doses of insulin into his body.

"I don't feel safe wearing these devices," said Radcliffe, who works for Rapid7, a security software maker. "It's better for me to stick myself with a needle."

Medtronic said it has made security improvements to its insulin pumps, though the company declined to give specifics.

George Grunberger, who has led the insulin pump management task force of the American Association of Clinical Endocrynologists, said he believes the benefits of pumps far outweigh any cyber risks, so he would not advise patients to follow Radcliffe's example.

(Reporting by Jim Finkle; Editing by Tiffany Wu)

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TOP NEWS: Kerry says status quo between Israel, Palestinians 'unsustainable'

BERLIN (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Wednesday that current relations between Israel and Palestine were "unsustainable" and that the United States was conscious of the urgency of the situation.



"The current situation, the status quo, is unsustainable," he said at a joint news conference with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in Berlin.



He added that it was necessary to find a way to negotiate and said the U.S. would continue with these efforts: "Obviously we understand the urgency of it," he said.



(Reporting by Noah Barkin and Michelle Martin)

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POLITICS NEWS: Brazil's Rousseff pulls ahead of Neves before Sunday's election: poll

By Anthony Boadle

BRASILIA (Reuters) - Incumbent President Dilma Rousseff pulled ahead again in a new poll ahead of Brazil's presidential election and she appears to be the favorite to win Sunday's runoff although the vote is still too close to call.

The Datafolha poll, released on Wednesday, was the fourth in three days to show that Rousseff is numerically in front of her rival Aecio Neves, the financial markets' favorite who has promised business-friendly policies to revive a sluggish economy.

Brazil's stocks and currency sold off for a second straight session on Tuesday after polls indicated that Neves is losing momentum in a race that he appeared to be leading last week.

Despite pessimism on financial markets, Brazilians surveyed by Datafolha were more optimistic about the future of their economy, which could be helping Rousseff, the polling firm said.

In the new survey, Rousseff's share of voter support has risen to 47 percent, from 46 percent in the previous Datafolha poll published on Monday. Support for Neves was unchanged at 43 percent.

While Rousseff has widened her numerical lead to four percentage points, the difference between them is still within the poll's margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

Excluding undecided voters, spoiled and blank survey responses, Rousseff has 52 percent against 48 percent for Neves, the poll showed, the same result as in Monday's poll.

Rousseff has gained ground despite a barrage of criticism from Neves who accuses her of mismanaging the economy and being responsible for a corruption scandal at Brazil's largest company, state-run oil producer Petroleo Brasileiro.

Neves dismissed his declining numbers on Tuesday, saying the polls were unreliable because they got it wrong in first-round voting on Oct. 5, when surveys underestimated his support and overestimated Rousseff's by a margin of 10 points.

Rousseff's re-election chances could gain further steam in the final days with the return to the campaign trail of Brazil's most popular politician, her mentor and predecessor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, founder of the ruling Workers' Party.

Rousseff is vowing to expand social programs that reduced poverty and inequality during 12 years of Workers' Party rule.

Neves has promised to jumpstart an economy that slipped into recession in the first half of this year. He says he would restore confidence in Brazil by taming inflation, curbing government expenditure and ending heavy-handed policies that have stifled investment.

Rousseff has said that Neves' policies will lead to unemployment and the rolling back of social programs, a warning that appears to have convinced many voters to give her another four years.

MARKETS NERVOUS

Many investors are hoping for a Neves victory, blaming Rousseff's policies for tipping Latin America's largest economy into a recession and damaging state-run companies.

Brazil's benchmark Bovespa share index slid more than 4 percent on Tuesday, adding to Monday's 2.55 percent slide, as investors grew concerned that Neves was slipping behind in the polls.

Shares in Petrobras, which investors say have been hurt by Rousseff's policies, slid 7 percent.

The Brazilian real plunged more than 1 percent to 2.50 per dollar in the first minutes of trading on Tuesday. The currency closed at 2.47, still 0.52 percent weaker for the day.

Contrary to market sentiment, Brazilians are increasingly optimistic about the prospects for inflation, employment and their purchasing power, Datafolha found.

In April 64 percent feared inflation would get worse. Now only 31 percent think so, even though inflation remains just above the government's target rate of 6.5 percent.

(Reporting by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Robert Birsel and Susan Fenton)

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