TheRegister
South Korea fines Google ₩207 billion for forking up attempts at creating Android variants
South Korea's Fair Trade Commission has fined Google ₩207 billion (US$177M) for abusing its market dominance in mobile operating systems by prohibiting forks of Android.…
Australia gave police power to compel sysadmins into assisting account takeovers – so they plan to use it
Australia's Federal Police force on Sunday announced it intends to start using new powers designed to help combat criminal use of encryption by taking over the accounts of some social media users, then deleting or modifying content they've posted.…
ASEAN bloc agrees to work on digital trade pact that might get real by 2025
The ASEAN economic and free trade bloc has agreed to develop a digital trade pact, and South Korea wants to play.…
Beijing orders Alibaba, Tencent, more Big Tech to stop blocking links to rivals
Beijing has yet again slapped regulations on Big Tech in China. This time, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has told app makers and web sites to stop blocking links to their rivals, or face the consequences.…
NASA's Perseverance rover nabs two Martian rock samples for scientists on Earth to study one day
NASA scientists can breathe a sigh of relief now that Perseverance has successfully collected not one but two Martian rock specimens, after its first attempt to obtain and store a sample failed.…
Apple emergency patches fix zero-click iMessage bug used to inject NSO spyware
Updated Apple on Monday issued security patches for its mobile and desktop operating systems, and for its WebKit browser engine, to address two security flaws, at least one of which was, it is said, used by autocratic governments to spy on human rights advocates.…
Amazon abuses dominance to keep wholesaler prices high, says DC AG in updated antitrust complaint
Amazon has been accused of pressuring wholesalers into selling goods at inflated prices on rival marketplaces through anticompetitve agreements, thus unfairly cementing its market dominance.…
How a glitch in the Matrix led to apps potentially exposing encrypted chats
The Matrix.org Foundation, which oversees the Matrix decentralized communication protocol, said on Monday multiple Matrix clients and libraries contain a vulnerability that can potentially be abused to expose encrypted messages.…
NYC subway SNAFU probably caused by someone turning it off accidentally, say reports
An outage that knocked out half of New York's subway system and left hundreds of passengers stuck in tunnels was likely caused by someone in a control centre pressing the wrong button and turning off part of the network, according to reports by New York Governor Kathy Hochul.…
EU open source study highlights economic benefits but says Union is 'on the back foot' with industrial policy
Interview A new EU study of the economic impact of open source has mixed news. The economic benefits are huge, it said, but the EU is "on the back foot" when it comes to implementation.…
Astro Pi 2: New Raspberry Pi hardware with updated camera, sensors to head to the ISS this year
Good news for earthbound Pi-tinkerers hoping to get their code into orbit: a follow-up to 2015's Astro Pi is due to head to the International Space Station (ISS) this year.…
BT hails hollow-core fibre trials as 'critical advancement' for secure communications
BT is claiming bragging rights after completing trials of hollow-core fibre (HCF) cable at its labs at Adastral Park in Suffolk, England.…
Open redirect on UK council website was being used for Royal Mail-themed parcel payments scam
An open redirect on a UK council-backed property website allowed low-level miscreants to evade filters.…
Spending watchdog blames British Home Office for delays to £1bn crime-fighting IT system
A critical report by the UK's public sector spending watchdog has blamed the Home Office for delays to a new crime-fighting IT platform designed to replace two systems on the verge of obsolescence.…
Fortnite banana can appear in court naked says judge in Epic vs Apple legal footnote
US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers late last week handed down a judgment [PDF] in the Epic Games vs Apple antitrust trial, which is likely to have significant consequences for developers and the corporations that control the ecosystems in which they operate.…
Wipro wins $44.5m deal for data centres and managed services at UK's National Grid
National Grid has signed up to spend up to $44.5m (approx. £32.2m) with Wipro, which will take on the energy infrastructure company's data centres and mainframes with a view to introducing a hybrid cloud infrastructure.…
Report: Microsoft and AWS scored $50m in contracts after Google pulled out of Pentagon's AI drone plan
In Brief Microsoft and AWS reportedly [PDF] scored subcontracts totalling $50m with the US Department of Defense to develop algorithms capable of recognizing objects from military drone footage after Google pulled out from the controversial Project Maven.…
The day has a 'y' in it, so Virgin Galactic has announced another delay
Virgin Galactic's schedule woes worsened last last week as the company pushed its next flight to mid-October thanks to a potentially defective flight control component.…
Tech widens the educational divide. And I should know – I'm a teacher in a pandemic
Register Debate Welcome to the latest Register Debate in which writers discuss technology topics, and you – the reader – choose the winning argument. The format is simple: we propose a motion, the arguments for the motion will run this Monday and Wednesday, and the arguments against on Tuesday and Thursday. During the week you can cast your vote on which side you support using the poll embedded below, choosing whether you're in favour or against the motion. The final score will be announced on Friday, revealing whether the for or against argument was most popular.…
AI caramba, those neural networks are power-hungry: Counting the environmental cost of artificial intelligence
Feature The next time you ask Alexa to turn off your bedroom lights or make a computer write dodgy code, spare a thought for the planet. The back-end mechanics that make it all possible take up a lot of power, and these systems are getting hungrier.…