In today’s Bulldog wrapup of technology news:

  • Lenovo’s parent is raising some $2 billion in an IPO
  • A union says all federal workers’ data was exposed in big hack
  • France tells Google to remove links in “right to be forgotten” order
  • A big Citrix shareholder wants more cuts
  • Amazon faces an EU probe over ebooks

The details:

Lenovo parent’s big IPO

Legend Holdings, the parent of Lenovo which operates its global executive headquarters in Morrisville, is raising nearly $2 billion in an IPO.

Legend will offer the shares in Hong Kong.

The firm is selling 15 percent of its shares, according to Business Times which cited information from IFR magazine, a Reuters publication/

Legend also operates a private equity fund and a property development company.

Read more at: http://www.businesstimes.com.sg/technology/lenovo-groups-owner-legend-holdings-to-raise-us196b-in-ipo

  • Union says all federal workers fell victim to hackers

A major federal union says the cyber theft of employee information is more damaging than it first appeared, asserting that hackers stole personnel data and Social Security numbers for every federal employee.

The Obama administration had acknowledged that up to 4 million current and former employees are affected by the December cyber breach of Office of Personnel Management data, but it had been vague about exactly what was taken.

But J. David Cox, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, said in a letter Thursday to OPM director Katherine Archuleta that based on incomplete information OPM provided to the union, “we believe that the Central Personnel Data File was the targeted database, and that the hackers are now in possession of all personnel data for every federal employee, every federal retiree, and up to 1 million former federalemployees.”

The OPM data file contains the records of non-military, non-intelligence executive branch employees, which covers most federal civilian employees but not, for example, members of Congress and their staffs.

The union believes the hackers stole military records and veterans’ status information, address, birth date, job and pay history, health insurance, life insurance, and pension information; and age, gender and race data, he said.

  • French privacy agency orders Google to remove global links

France’s data privacy agency ordered Google to remove search results worldwide upon request, giving the company two weeks to apply the “right to be forgotten” globally.

The order Friday from CNIL comes more than a year after Europe’s highest court ruled that people have the right to control what appears when their name is searched online.

So far, Google says it has received more than 268,000 requests to remove URLs after the May 2014 decision. French citizens lead the European Union in requests, with more than 55,000.

Not all requests are granted — public figures cannot erase a sordid episode reported in the media while criminal convictions can remain in place. According to the company, Facebook accounted for the largest contingent of deleted URLs.

But switching to a non-European Google domain can pull up the deleted links in a matter of clicks.

  • Big Citrix shareholder wants more cuts

Lauren K. Ohnesorge of the Triangle Business Journal reports that Elliott Management, a big shareholder in Citrix with 7/1 percent of its shares, wants more cuts in order to drive up shareholder return.

“Despite Citrix’s strong products, the Company’s stock price performance tells the story of deep underperformance,” the company said in a letter.

Citrix has a huge operation in Raleigh at its ShareFile operation.

Read the details at: http://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/blog/techflash/2015/06/stockholder-demands-more-cuts-at-citrix.html

  • EU launches antitrust investigation into Amazon over e-books

The European Union has launched an antitrust investigation into online retailer Amazon over its distribution of e-books, which have become increasingly popular in recent years.

The European Commission said Thursday it will investigate certain clauses in Amazon’scontracts with publishers, including a requirement for publishers to inform the company about arrangements it has with Amazon competitors.

Amazon, which is the largest distributor of e-books in Europe and owns the popular Kindle e-book device, has already faced pressure from the commission over its tax structures, specifically over whether its European operations enjoyed an unfair competitive advantage by being based in low-cost Luxembourg.

Margrethe Vestager, the commission’s top official on competition policy, stressed that theinvestigation, which will center on the largest markets of English and German e-books, doesn’t call into question Amazon’s successful and comprehensive service.