A French prosecutor has launched a preliminary investigation of U.S. tech giant Apple over alleged deception and planned obsolescence of its products following a complaint by a consumer organization, a judicial source said on Monday.

The investigation, opened on Friday, will be led by French consumer fraud watchdog DGCCRF, part of the Economy Ministry, the source said. Apple acknowledged last month that it takes some measures to reduce power demands - which can have the effect of slowing the processor - in some older iPhone models when a phone’s battery is having trouble supplying the peak current that the processor demands. 

Facebook acknowledged on Friday that too much social media can be bad for you, a remarkable admission as the 2-billion member online service battles mounting criticism about its impact on society.

In a blog post published on Friday, Facebook addressed a "hard question": "Is spending time on social media bad for us?" In it, the social networking firm cites academic research indicating that in certain instances using Facebook can have a negative effect on people's moods, and that heavier users of the site can have worse mental health. 

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted along party lines on Thursday to repeal landmark 2015 rules aimed at ensuring a free and open internet, setting up a court fight over a move that could recast the digital landscape.

The approval of FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s proposal in a 3-2 vote marked a victory for internet service providers such as AT&T Inc, Comcast Corp and Verizon Communications Inc and hands them power over what content consumers can access. It also is the biggest win for Pai in his sweeping effort to undo many telecommunications regulations since taking over at the agency in January. 

Google researchers have developed a privacy application that can instantly detect when a stranger glances at your screen over your shoulder.

Researchers will demonstrate their shoulder-surfing warning system at next month's Neural Information Processing Systems Conference. The pair haven't released a paper that explains technology, but a video demonstration suggests they've installed a lightweight machine-learning model on a Pixel smartphone that uses its front-facing camera for rapid gaze detection. When the user holds a phone up to chat or view a private video, the algorithm will detect when someone looking at the screen too. 

Phishing is still a key tool for cyber criminals as they seek to insert malware onto machines and to get hold of personal details.

Although most people are aware of the threat there are still some subject lines that are much more likely to deliver results for the phishermen than others, according to security awareness training specialist KnowBe4, which has released its Top 10 Global Phishing Email Subject Lines report for the third quarter of 2017. The company looked at tens of thousands of email subject lines used in simulated phishing tests to uncover just what makes a user want to click. 

There's no way around it – we are addicted to our smartphones. Smartphone addiction even has a name now; nomophobia, short for no-mobile-phone phobia.

We've all probably experienced the symptoms at one point: panicking when separated from our smartphone, not being able to focus at work or during conversations, and constantly checking phones for new notifications. The idea of being addicted to a screen is not a nice one, and according to a Deloitte survey, smartphone users have started to realize they might have a problem. Smartphone usage has been trending upwards since 2015, but for the first time Deloitte found that smartphone usage declined or plateaued in 2017.

Apple is soft-launching direct, person-to-person payments in an iMessage today with the Apple Pay Cash beta. The feature, which was announced earlier this year, allows you to send and receive cash inside the Messages app on iPhones. The program is launching in public beta today on iOS 11.2 beta 2, and you can opt in using the iOS Public Beta program here. 

Once you’ve updated, you’ll see an Apple Pay button in the apps section of Messages that allows you to initiate a payment. Payments can also be triggered by simply asking for money in a message or tapping on a message sent by someone else asking for money. 

California — California's Central Valley is known for its miles and miles of farm orchards, fights over water rights, and, these days, high unemployment. High-tech? Not so much.

But I was here on Monday to see in action a cutting-edge technology that has the potential to greatly reshape our economy and society — the self-driving car. Waymo, Google's autonomous vehicle spinoff, has its testing facility at a decommissioned Air Force base. The company invited several dozen reporters to see its cars in action, get a ride in one, and hear its case that its technology is all-but ready for the real world. 

One day, your household items and accessories could become a new way to authenticate yourself online, according to researchers. Many websites and online services are now enforcing or at least offering two-factor authentication (2FA) as a way to enhance the security of your accounts.

We all know passwords are less than ideal these days, being susceptible to brute-force hacking as many of us use simple, repetitive phrases -- not to mention the flood of data leaks taking place every day -- and so other methods are now needed. Two-factor authentication utilizes a second method of verification to check someone's identity. 

Google’s artificial intelligence group, DeepMind, has unveiled the latest incarnation of its Go-playing program, AlphaGo – an AI so powerful that it derived thousands of years of human knowledge of the game before inventing better moves of its own, all in the space of three days.

Named AlphaGo Zero, the AI program has been hailed as a major advance because it mastered the ancient Chinese board game from scratch, and with no human help beyond being told the rules. In games against the 2015 version, which famously beat Lee Sedol, the South Korean grandmaster, in the following year, AlphaGo Zero won 100 to 0. The feat marks a milestone on the road to general-purpose AIs.