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"Venezuela: a devaluation at high risk

The devaluation of the Venezuelan currency, announced January 8, will have an impact of around 40 million euros on profit before tax and non recurring items of the group in 2009 and approximately 15 million euros on profit current net after-tax, said Accor in a statement. Despite this impact, the Group maintains its objective of profit before tax and non recurring items of between 400 and 450 million euros for 2009. Accor is present mainly in Venezuela through its prepaid service activities (luncheon vouchers, preloaded maps, gift certificates).

Venezuela on Friday announced the devaluation of the bolivar. The currency, whose exchange rate was 2.15 to one U.S. dollar, now trades at 4.30 to the dollar.

Last October, the fourth global hotel group confirmed its financial targets in 2009 but expressed cautious for the year 2010.

Accor will publish its turnover in 2009 January 19 next.

The Accor share price closed Monday down 0.63% to 37.59 euros while the CAC 40 lost 0.05% to 4043.09 points.

The Supreme Court has sentenced in mid-November the ISP Free, a subsidiary of Iliad, to pay 2,500 euros to one of his subscribers who had complained in 2004 unable to receive television has yet endorsed a bid Triple Play (offers TV / Telephone / Internet) in the latter.

The customer had initially attacked Free before a judge near Orleans, demanding repayment of sums paid as damages. The verdict delivered on 1 July 2008 had gone in the direction of the operator who spoke of the technical problems he had informed his client at the outset of his subscription.The judge had chosen and the "obligation of means" and not "result" to make its ruling.

"The obligation of result" reached by the Court of Cassation

The Court of Cassation found instead that Free was indeed subject to an obligation of result vis-à-vis his client to provide the service for which he had paid, and only one case of "force majeure" would could relieve the operator and justify the breach of his contractual obligation that the technical incidents are not mentioned.

Such a ruling could set a precedent.That case, in addition to its symbolic of the victory of a "simple" client on a company such as Free, has serious consequences for the entire sector, as it will force all providers to verify that TV services are actually available before offering them to their future customers, under penalty of prosecution.

Without recourse, the operator has been convicted yet declined comment.

Nothing seems easier than to hack Facebook. Hackers have thus taken control of nearly 300 community groups on the popular social networking site Facebook, in order to demonstrate how personal data is vulnerable on the Internet.

"Hello, we announce that we have officially turned your Facebook group, said CYI (Control Your Info). This means that we control some of your information on Facebook. If we wanted we could show you a way that could severely damage your image.For example, we could rename your group inappropriately as 'I support pedophilia'.

The aim of the operation is not to harm: "It's just one example that really shows the vulnerabilities of social networking sites," the group said in a message posted on its website controlyour.info, ensuring that his motives were honest and educational purpose.

Facebook groups are places of thematic discussions that followers of the social networking site can join to discuss with other people who share their interests. According CYI, these groups "have a major flaw," because "if the administrator of a group goes, anyone can register as a new director.CYI members say that after having obtained the status of administrator, it is easy to make any changes, including photos or group settings.

CYI has sent messages to groups infiltrated to warn them that they had been "hijacked" and promised to restore their original appearance after being heard on the subject. "Our main objective is to draw attention to issues of privacy on the Internet," indicate these cyber activists. "Some people have even lost their jobs because of content on Facebook. We wanted to do something about this subject, add-t they.