The news at a glance

AT&T: Putting bandwidth hogs on notice

AT&T this week began to meter the Internet usage of its smart-phone customers, said David Lieberman in USA Today, signaling an industry shift to charges “based on how much people use their phones to access videos, music, and data.” Beginning this week, the phone giant is offering two data plans: $15 a month for 200 megabytes of data—the equivalent of 100 minutes of streaming video—or 10 times that capacity for $25 a month. Analysts said the plan is necessary to “control heavy users, or at least get them to pay more.” The data limits apply to Apple’s wildly popular iPhones, for which AT&T is the sole U.S. Internet provider, as well as to Apple iPad tablet computers ordered after June 7.

AT&T’s shift “moves Internet innovation in the wrong direction,” said J.P. Mangalindan in CNNmoney.com. The new charges will cause people to “question whether every website visited, every application downloaded, and every video viewed is pushing them over the limit.” Developers, in turn, will have to be “more cognizant of these data caps,” and so they’ll be discouraged from creating data-intensive new offerings. Just like that, the Internet will no longer be about “unlimited expansion and unexplored possibilities.”

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Investigations: Goldman subpoenaed

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission has subpoenaed Goldman Sachs, saying the company “failed to comply with the panel’s requests for documents and interviews in a timely manner,” said Ronald Orol in Marketwatch.com. The government commission, formed to investigate the causes of the 2008 market convulsion, accused Goldman of dumping 2.5 billion pages of documents on investigators, rather than delivering the specific information they requested. Panel Chairman Phil Angelides said Goldman was attempting “to run out the clock” before the commission’s final report, due Dec. 15. “We should not be forced to play ‘Where’s Waldo’ on behalf of the American people,” Angelides said. Goldman says it’s complying with the commission’s requests.

Deals: Insurance broker sells security unit

Marsh & McLennan announced that it plans to sell its Kroll security-consulting operation to Altegrity Inc. for $1.1 billion, said Andrew Frye in Bloomberg.com. Kroll, which Marsh & McLennan acquired for $1.9 billion in 2004, “conducts investigations to uncover fraud and locates misappropriated assets.” In the 1990s, it investigated Saddam Hussein’s financial network on behalf of Kuwait.

Gadgets: Apple unveils fourth-generation iPhone

Apple this week introduced the iPhone 4, the latest version of the company’s popular smart phone, said John Sutter in CNNmoney.com. Billed as “the thinnest smart phone on the planet,” the iPhone 4 is 9.3 millimeters thick, 25 percent thinner than the iPhone 3. New features include a front-facing camera for videoconferencing and an updated operating system that allows users to, for example, search the Web while listening to streaming radio. The 16-gigabyte model will retail for $200; the 32-gigabyte model goes for $300.

Defense: Lockheed Martin reorganizes

Defense contractor Lockheed Martin is divesting itself of two subsidiaries and reorganizing its operations, “in part to head off conflict-of-interest concerns,” said Marjorie Censer in The Washington Post. Lockheed Martin will sell two units that provide the Pentagon with systems-integration and engineering services. The move comes as the Pentagon is drafting new rules that would not allow units of the same company that builds a data system to also evaluate its effectiveness.