PRIVACY

Google Inc said it may create a stand-alone version of its Buzz social networking product but won't separate Buzz from its Gmail service, a linkup that has spurred controversy over privacy.

The government argued on Friday that it should be allowed access to people's cell-phone records to help track suspected criminals.

Switzerland must consider the automatic exchange of tax information with European Union governments if Swiss banks are to have unlimited access to EU markets, the country's finance minister said in an interview published on Sunday.

The United States is unwilling to re-enter talks to alter a key deal struck with Switzerland to end a damaging tax case against Swiss banking group UBS AG , the U.S. ambassador in Berne was quoted saying in a Swiss Sunday paper.

A top Democratic senator said on Tuesday he has asked 30 U.S. companies, including Apple, Facebook and Skype, for information on their human rights practices in China in the aftermath of Google's decision to no longer cooperate with Chinese Internet censorship efforts.

Google Chief Executive Officer Eric Schmidt on Friday expressed his company's dislike of China's censorship policies, even as it pursues opportunities to remain in the country without censoring its search engine.

Canada's privacy czar, who got Facebook to agree last year to better protect users' personal information, will launch a new investigation over complaints that the changes sometimes make things worse.

The Swiss government said it was sure it could resolve a legal impasse threatening a deal struck by the U.S. and bank UBS to hand over data on clients the U.S. suspects of dodging taxes.

The Swiss government needs to resolve the legal impasse which threatens to derail a deal with U.S. tax authorities over UBS client data, the bank's chairman Kaspar Villiger was quoted as saying on Wednesday.

A client of Swiss bank UBS won an appeal to prevent her account data from being given to the United States as part of a U.S. probe into possible tax evasion among wealthy bank customers.

Congress should enact a law laying the groundwork for protecting consumers who use the Internet cloud to store data before states come in with an unwieldy patchwork of conflicting legislation, said Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith on Wednesday.

Microsoft Corp. has pulled almost every version of Office from its own online store in compliance with a court order after a patent dispute with Canadian firm i4i.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said that online privacy is no longer the social norm as users of social networking sites like Facebook become more comfortable sharing information on the Internet.

The chief whistleblower in the UBS AG tax secrecy probe entered prison to serve a sentence he considered unfair, hours after a Swiss court ruled the bank should not have been forced to turn over client files to government investigators.

The Swiss financial regulator broke bank secrecy law last year when it ordered UBS to hand over the files of nearly 300 clients to U.S. authorities, a Swiss court said on Friday.

A U.S. judge on Monday upheld the prison sentence of a key informant in the tax fraud case against Swiss bank UBS AG and ordered him to start serving his 40-month term as scheduled this Friday.

A U.S. judge on Monday rejected a request to consider reducing the prison sentence of a key informant in the tax fraud case against Swiss bank UBS AG, and he ordered former UBS banker Bradley Birkenfeld to start serving his 40-month sentence as scheduled this Friday.

The U.S. Justice Department is considering whether to ask a judge to reduce the jail sentence of Bradley Birkenfeld, the key informant in the U.S. tax fraud case against Swiss bank UBS AG, the New York Times said, citing a person briefed on the matter.

The key informant in the U.S. tax fraud case against Swiss bank UBS AG says he does not deserve the federal prison term he is due to start serving next month, according to an interview to be broadcast on Sunday.

The path toward rolling out wider use of whole-body security scanners in U.S. airports runs through the White House.

Technology exists that might have detected explosives hidden in the underwear of a Nigerian man accused of trying to blow up a plane over Detroit, but cost and privacy worries have until now prevented its widespread use.