Image: Dimitar Nikolov/Flickr (Creative Commons)
Back in November 2010, the European Commission launched an antitrust investigation into Google after two websites complained. Now, the results are in – and Google could face a suit on its hands, after it found four areas where it may be considered an abuse of its market dominance.
Both the European Commission and the Department of Justice in the United States have cleared a deal that will see Google and Motorola finally tie the knot, after the US$12.5 billion deal was announced last August.
Image: Dimitar Nikolov/Flickr (Creative Commons)
The European Commission has announced sweeping reforms in privacy and data protection laws within the union – including a single legal framework, and stronger penalties to make sure companies abide by these new rules.
Okay, we get it. We fail at comedy. Don’t get your knickers in a twist. We discuss the Wikileaks saga, the fact that Porn aims to be the next Google in stealing your private data and that Apple tries to push a dead social network with a dead celebrity.
Microsoft and Intel had face them. Now it’s Google’s turn. The search engine will be investigated by the European Union for antitrust violations, with the European Commission accusing that Google had abused its dominant position in the search engine market.
The European Commission, which is the antitrust regulator of the entire 27-nation European Union (similar to our ACCC), has launched an investigation into IBM on allegations that the company abused its dominant position in the mainframe computer market.
A leaked document from the President of the European Union has revealed the European Union’s secret push for criminal prosecution in the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), an agreement that has been negotiated in secret.
The European Union has given its approval to Orcale’s purchase of Sun Microsystems, the owners of several technologies like MySQL and Java, after finalising its investigation that was opened in September of last year.
A new law proposed by the Italian Government could see the citizens of Italy requiring a licence to upload videos to the Internet from the Communications Ministry, which could reduce the freedom of communications, according to lawmakers opposed to the new law.
The European Commission has opened an antitrust investigation into software maker Oracle and its planned purchase of Sun Microsystems, as the commission says it has serious worries about the deal that could see higher prices and limited choice for database software.
Shares in Global Gaming Factory X (GGF) rocketed up by 150 percent after news of its acquisition of The Pirate Bay’s assets, but reports are now coming in that the Aktietorget, the Swedish equity marketplace, are now investigating insider trading claims.
In what has been a turbulent week for The Pirate Bay, they have launched quietly their anonymous virtual private network, IPREDator, to the public. The new network, like we reported before, hopes to give you anonymous access to the internet, so the ISPs won’t be able to trace your steps.
The Swedish Pirate Party (Piratpartiet), which is not affiliated with the Pirate Bay (according to WIkipedia) has managed to secure at least one seat in the European Parliament out of a possible 18 seats (or 20, once the Lisbon Treaty is ratified) – winning 7.1 percent of the vote, above the 4 percent needed to win a seat.
The European Union may force Microsoft to put more browsers into the operating system after being “frustrated with past efforts”, as put by the Wall Street Journal, with their previous responses over previous sanctions made by the European Commission.
Several sources are claiming that both Hulu (owned by News Corp., NBC Universal and now Disney) and YouTube (owned by Google) are talking separate deals with UK broadcasters the BBC, Channel 4 and ITV to allow their shows to be on demand on their respective websites.