Google News hits the UK

The world's biggest search engine Google has introduced a UK specific version of its Google News service. Based around the current Google News service that incorporates news from some 4,500 news sources, the UK version offers prominence to British business, political, entertainment and sports news updated constantly. Generated entirely automatically, Google News UK allows users to browse headlines and photos with categories such as World, UK, Business, Entertainment, Technology and Sport. ...more

Google moves to protect user privacy

Google, with mountains of data on its users' search habits, is taking steps to boost consumer privacy protections in coming months, the company said late on Wednesday. The world's leading provider of Web search said it is taking steps to anonymize, or obscure details, after 18 to 24 months on the surfing habits of tens of millions of Web users that could potentially be used to identify individuals. The Mountain View, California-based company collects information on Web searches, such as the keyword queries, Internet addresses and 'cookies' used by Web sites and advertisers, to track Web surfing habits. ...more

European broadband figures gaining on Asian leaders

South Korea still leads the world when it comes to broadband, but Europe is catching - these are the findings of a new survey on the global penetration of fast Internet access. The headline figures are that the number of broadband subscribers in the world (at the end of Q1 2005) has reached 158mn. The Asia-Pacific region is the biggest broadband market in the world - reports TelecomPaper - with more than 61mn subscribers and a 39 per cent share of the global broadband market. ...more

Interactive TV without cable access

Set-top box allows truly interactive TV even in areas without access to cable networks. Netgem's i-Player was launched last November complete with a dial-up connection for pay-as-you-go Internet access, but is now available with the ISP of your choice. Previously you had to use Netgem's ISP and associated email addresses. ...more

Nokia goes button crazy

Nokia's newly launched 5510 looks like no other mobile phone on the market, with a full keyboard either side of a largish screen. An obvious ploy to get people SMS messaging on a full time basis it may well be, particularly as Nokia is looking to roll out its multimedia messaging service. But the handset also packs a digital music player that supports AAC (Advanced Audio Coding) and MP3 formats, backed up by 64Mb of memory. ...more