When Samsung went on a patent lawsuit spree last year in the European courts, they may have reneged on an agreement they gave the European Telecommunications Standards Institute to license any “essential patents” to competitors “fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory” terms. So now the EU is investigating Samsung on suspicion that they distorted competition in the mobile market. Fun! More »
“Backscatter” X-ray machines, which bombard your body with radiation at the airport, are a subject of controversy in the US. Not in Europe, Mother Jones reports — the machines are now banned throughout the entire EU over cancer risks. Good. More »
The new facial recognition photo-tagging feature that was rolled out on Facebook this week has got privacy-freaks in a frenzy, but none more so than European Union data-protection regulators, who are investigating it for privacy violations. More »
Nine chip makers – including heavy hitters like Samsung and Hitachi – have collectively been fined $US404 million by the European Commission over DRAM price fixing. Cartels: they’re not just for drug lords anymore. More »
After villagers chased the Street View cars away in Buckinghamshire, England, it became pretty obvious last year that a lot of Brits were unhappy having their houses and streets documented online. Now, European regulators have told Google they must delete images obtained by the street cars every six months. More »
Microsoft’s newest attempt to appease the EU is to create a system in which end users can choose their browsers. (Imagine that! Choice!) This is a change from Microsoft’s previous offer to remove Internet Explorer completely from Windows 7. More »
As part of an effort to alleviate its current European Union-sized headache across the Atlantic, Microsoft has volunteered to remove Internet Explorer from Windows 7. The move is an about face for the company, which had previously testified such a removal was impossible. More »
