US tech titans look to ditch passwords
Reliance on passwords alone is decried as a major security flaw on the internet, with people keeping them overly simple or using the same one repeatedly to make...
The US tech giant was fined two million euros for abusive commercial practices and told to modify seven clauses in its contracts, according to a ruling by a commercial court in Paris issued on Monday and seen by AFP on Tuesday.
The decision was taken at the request of the Russian General Prosecutor's Office, according to a statement by the country's media regulator Roskomnadzor cited by the agencies.
Britain has accepted changes proposed by Google to address competition and customer privacy concerns linked to online advertising.
In recent years Russia has been piling pressure on Western social media giants, with President Vladimir Putin saying those companies were becoming as influential as elected governments.
A public count of likes -- or dislikes -- that social media posts rack up is regularly cited by critics as harmful to well-being, and Facebook as well as Instagram have allowed users to opt out.
Internet reliability is a problem in Africa where less than a third of the continent's 1.3 billion people are connected to broadband, according to the World Bank.
Artificial intelligence was put to work in Google's free Maps service in the United States to show people the most fuel efficient routes to destinations even if they are not the quickest.
Russia in recent months has been taking legal action against foreign tech companies for not deleting content banned by the authorities, including pornographic material or posts deemed extremist or condoning drugs or suicide.
Google's "safe search" -- which excludes sensitive or mature content -- will be the default setting for users under 18, which up to now had been the case only for under-13 users.
Google's Pixel line has captured scant share in a global smartphone market dominated by Samsung, Apple and Chinese manufacturers.
The penalty is part of a settlement reached after three media groups, News Corp, French daily Le Figaro and Belgium's Groupe Rossel, accused Google of effectively having a monopoly over online ad sales.
The litigation aimed at the Play Store online shop for apps and other digital content for Android smartphones comes as the power of Big Tech firms is facing increasing pressure from regulators and lawsuits.
The former US president said that the nation's top tech firms had become the "enforcers of illegal, unconstitutional censorship". He was banned from posting on Facebook and Twitter in the wake of the deadly January 6 siege of the US Capitol by his supporters.
In 2019, an EU directive gave media rights to be compensated for links to their content by web giants in order to ensure better compensation for creators of news content.
The phasing out of third-party cookies -- bits of software that keep track of sites visited by users -- will be pushed back into mid-2023 instead of late 2022 for the Chrome browser, Google said in a blog post.
Legislation being forwarded to the floor of the House of Representatives could force an overhaul of the practices of Google, Apple, Amazon and Facebook, or potentially lead to a breakup of the dominant tech giants.
The penalty is part of a settlement reached after three media groups - News Corp, French daily Le Figaro and Belgium's Groupe Rossel - accused Google of effectively having a monopoly over online ad sales.
Facebook said on Sunday it would be investing with partners on the subsea cables known as Echo and Bifrost to connect Singapore, Indonesia and North America, which would increase overall transpacific capacity by 70%.