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Facebook has revealed that it received between 9,000 and 10,000 data requests from U.S. government entities during the second half of 2012.

You may recall that earlier this week, Facebook was one of the major Internet firms to appeal to the U.S. government to allow it to be transparent about how many requests it receives for user data. The social network was joined in its call by Google and Microsoft, who were desperate to counteract media reports that the NSA had "direct access" to their servers; a claim they all denied, and which now seems to have been likely false.

Following negotiations with U.S. national security officials, Facebook can now give details about the FISA and other national security requests it receives from various government sources.

"For the six months ending December 31, 2012, the total number of user-data requests Facebook received from any and all government entities in the U.S. (including local, state, and federal, and including criminal and national security-related requests) – was between 9,000 and 10,000," Ted Ullyot, Facebook General Counsel, wrote.

Those 9,000-10,000 requests received by Facebook during the six month period involved about 18,000-19,000 accounts. The reason for the claims is not all national security either. While some do relate to terrorism investigations, Facebook is also requested to help in cases of missing children or pursued fugitives. Facebook data in those cases could shed light on where people are.

Microsoft has confirmed that its first-party titles for the upcoming Xbox One will cost $59.99, just as they do on the Xbox 360.

Speaking bluntly, a company representative says "I can confirm that Microsoft Studios games on Xbox One will be $59.99 (MSRP)."

Sony America president Jack Tretton made a similar announcement for his company earlier this year, saying "We're going to welcome free-to-play models, games from $.99 up to those $60 games."

Amazon, Gamestop and other major retailers have been pricing pre-order games at the $59.99 price point.

Less than a week after the company purchased an FM radio station in an effort to get better royalty rates, the BMI has sued Pandora, calling the purchase a "stunt" and a cry for attention.

BMI collects license fees for songwriters and composers.

"Pandora's stunt makes a mockery of the performing rights licenses and the rate court process," BMI said in its suit. It is now asking the court to set "reasonable, market-driven fees for Pandora." The organization claims direct negotiations have completely fallen apart.

Pandora has been alleging that the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) has allowed artists to selectively back out of licensing popular songs to the service, and has even filed a motion claiming "ASCAP has violated the terms of its antitrust consent decree with the Department of Justice."

The company then purchased KXMZ-FM in Rapid City, SD, in an effort to gain access to the alleged preferential treatment ASCAP has given terrestrial stations.

Microsoft, in an ongoing effort to alienate fans, has left confusing messages as to whether the upcoming Xbox One console will function properly outside of the "supported" countries it is being released in.

For example, Microsoft says the Xbox One "requires account on Xbox Live in an Xbox One-supported Xbox Live country" and "Xbox One games are for activation and distribution only in specified geographic regions."

Xbox support has also responded on Twitter to questions about playing imported games, or taking your console on the road, and the answers are not promising (see below). Microsoft has only confirmed 21 countries for the console this year, with more expected next year at unknown times. A few major gaming hubs, like Japan, are not on that list.

The Verge asked Microsoft directly if the console is IP-locked:

At this time, we have announced Xbox One will be available in 21 markets in November this year and additional markets later in 2014. Similar to the movie and music industry, games and other content must meet country-specific regulatory guidelines before they are cleared for sale - which means that games will work in the broad geographic regions for which they have been cleared, much as today with Xbox 360. While the console itself is not geographically restricted, a user's Xbox Live account, content, apps and experiences are all tied to the country of billing and residence.

The European Commission is seeking answers from U.S. attorney general Eric Holder on NSA data requests.

Commission Vice President, Viviane Reding, wrote to Holder expressing concerns that American spying practices could have "adverse consequences for the fundamental rights of EU citizens."

In the letter, Reding highlighted seven areas of concern for the European Commission...

• Are they only aimed at gathering the data of US citizens and residents, or are they also - or even primarily - targeting non-US nationals, including EU citizens?
• Is the data collection limited to specific and individual cases and, if so, what criteria is applied?
• How regularly is the data of individuals collected or processed in bulk?
• What is the scope of Prism and other such programmes? Is it limited to national security and foreign intelligence, and if so how are such terms defined?
• How might companies in the US and EU challenge the efforts to access and analyse the data?
• What ways might EU citizens find out if they have been affected? How is this different to the situation for US citizens and residents?
• How might EU citizens and companies challenge any effort to access and process their personal data? How does this compare to the rights offered to US citizens and residents?

Officials in the United States are calling on smartphone makers to make changes that will deter the theft of mobile phones.

Handset makers have been criticized in the past for dragging their feet on adding features that could fight against the epidemic of handset theft. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon formed a coalition to address the problem, and to work with vendors to create features, like a "kill switch", that can render a stolen device useless.

Law enforcement authorities have been warning about mobile phone theft, as it becomes increasingly violent and prevalent. In San Francisco, more than half of reported robberies in 2012 involves a mobile phone. One study estimated the cost of phone theft at about $30 billion.

"This nationwide coalition of leaders is committed to doing everything in our power to encourage industry to be good corporate citizens and take responsible steps to ensure the safety of our consumers," Schneiderman said in a statement.

Twitter has been ordered by a French court to reveal the identities of users who posted anti-Semitic tweets on the service.

The Paris High Court ordered the micro-blogging service to reveal the identities to France's Union of Jewish Students (UEJF) and four others, and this week it has rejected an appeal made by Twitter against the order.

"We are disappointed that the court has decided not to hear our appeal. We are considering our options, including resubmitting the appeal," a Twitter spokeswoman said.

Twitter did block the content in France after it had been reported to the service. The Paris High Court had ordered it to set up and easily accessible and visible method for users to notify the management of content that constituted "apology for crimes against humanity and incitement to racial hatred."

"Twitter has not made any progress in regards to respecting our country's laws," said UEJF's president Jonathan Hayoun. "The first step towards making any kind of progress could be finally listening to the court's decision, and making sure that its social network is not a lawless place."

A Japanese telecommunications company is running a trial in Japan this week, delivering 4K video content over the Internet to set-top boxes connected to 4K TVs.

While 4K televisions are already on the market, 4K content itself is much less prevalent. The new H.265 codec cuts the streaming bandwidth requirements for 4K (and 1080p) roughly in half, compared to common H.264 currently in wide usage.

NTT West in Japan is testing a 4K-STB system to determine the feasibility of streaming 4K content over the Internet straight to the TV, as broadcasts in 4K will take more time to become common. Japan will be the first country to broadcast 4K programming over satellite, aiming to be ready in time for the 2014 World Cup.

The test underway this week will hint at whether online streaming services, like Netflix, can get the jump on everyone else this time by becoming the first services that can deliver premium 4K content to 4K televisions.

A report suggests that Apple is thinking about following Samsung's lead and releasing iPhones with larger screens, as well as cheaper handsets.

According to Reuters sources, Apple is considering releasing two iPhones with larger screens measuring 4.7-inches and 5.7-inches. The intent is to compete with South Korean bitter rival Samsung Electronics in the market for "phablets".

Sources also told Reuters that Apple is planning much cheaper iPhone models that come in 5-6 colours, with a goal of providing a model at just $99.

The new strategy would cater to investor demands who find Apple's pace of innovation and release cycle too slow. Samsung also has put a lot of different devices on the market with a variety of price points, providing consumers with far more smartphone options than Apple is.

This year, Apple is expected to launch two new iPhone models. The "iPhone 5S" is expected to launch with new fingerprint technology, and the cheaper model with a plastic case is also rumoured.

Eight charged in New Jersey with conspiracy to commit cyberattacks on financial institutions and government sites, to commit money laundering and identity theft.

The group are charged with a scheme to use information hacked from customer accounts held at more than a dozen banks, brokerage firms, payroll processing companies and government agencies in an attempt to steal at least $15 million from U.S. customers

Allegedly, Oleksiy Sharapka, 33, of Kiev, Ukraine, directed the conspiracy with the help of Leonid Yanovitsky, 38, also of Kiev.

Oleg Pidtergerya, 49, of Brooklyn, N.Y.; Robert Dubuc, 40, of Malden, Mass.; and Andrey Yarmolitskiy, 41, of Atlanta, managed crews in their respective cities. Richard Gundersen, 46, of Brooklyn, and Lamar Taylor, 37, of Salem, Mass, worked for Pidtergerya and Dubuc, respectively. Ilya Ostapyuk, 31, of Brooklyn, allegedly facilitated the movement of fraud proceeds.

"According to the complaint unsealed today, cybercriminals penetrated some of our most trusted financial institutions as part of a global scheme that stole money and identities from people in the United States," said New Jersey U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman.

"Today's charges and arrests take out key members of the organization, including leaders of crews in three states that used those stolen identities to 'cash out' hacked accounts in a series of internationally coordinated modern-day bank robberies. We will continue to pursue our investigation into this scheme and our fight against the rising threat of criminals for whom computers are the weapon of choice."

Facebook has decided to take advantage of the all powerful hashtag to drive larger discussions across the social network.

Every Twitter user knows the importance of hashtags. They link together tweets under one topic, getting a large "conversation" going. You see topics presented with hashtags on all kinds of TV shows during broadcasts, in an effort to get people talking about the content.

Facebook has decided that it needs to embrace the hashtag.

"Starting today, hashtags will be clickable on Facebook. Similar to other services like Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr, or Pinterest, hashtags on Facebook allow you to add context to a post or indicate that it is part of a larger discussion," Greg Lindley wrote on the Facebook blog.

"When you click on a hashtag in Facebook, you'll see a feed of what other people and Pages are saying about that event or topic."

#SoundsFamiliar

Researchers have detailed a weakness effecting some iPhone that can be exploited to force devices to connect to malicious Wi-Fi networks.

Even if the iPhone had never connected to a Wi-Fi network before, this attack method could still work, Skycure researchers found. The problem actually lies with the configuration settings installed by wireless carriers.

In order to provide customers with more reliable data connections on the move, Wi-Fi hotspots are setup in public places targeted at just their customers. For example, AT&T pre-sets iPhones to connect to networks with an SSID of "attwifi". The problem is simple, this connection can happen automatically with no user interaction.

"Setting up such Wi-Fi networks would initiate an automatic attack on nearby customers of the carrier, even if they are using an out-of-the-box iOS device that never connected to any Wi-Fi network," the researchers wrote.

A test carried out in a restaurant in Tel Aviv resulted in 60 connections to an imposter network within a minute. At the International Cyber Security Conference, Skycure did the same thing and recorded 448 connections within a two and half hour period.

AT&T has finally confirmed the release date for the rugged Samsung Galaxy S4 Active.

The Active is a 5-inch 1080p LCD device powered by a quad-core 1.9GHz Snapdragon 600 CPU that is very similar to the Galaxy S4 except that some of the aesthetics have been changed.

Samsung says the device will be aimed at those with a more active lifestyle that require a more rugged phone. The phone is IP67 certified to be water-resistant and dust-resistant.

The device has an 8MP camera instead of the 13MP camera seen on the S4, to keep prices lower, and the device will be available in grey and teal.

AT&T will make the device available on June 21st.

The hits just keep on coming for Nintendo.

One of its biggest developer partners, Ubisoft, has said today it will not create any more exclusive titles for the Wii U console until the company sells more units.

Bluntly, CEO Yves Guillemot said, "We need more [Wii U] sold."

Earlier this year Ubisoft said they remain committed to the console, even when others like EA took the opposite stance, discontinuing development for the console. The publisher has one of the biggest hits for the Wii U, ZombiU, which was so popular that Nintendo even created hardware bundles around it.

Nintendo recently announced updates for first party smash hits Super Mario, Legend of Zelda, Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros., and Donkey Kong Country, all of which are almost guaranteed to be hits. Guillemot says he hopes the new games will help spur hardware sales, as well.

Xbox boss Don Mattrick, during an interview this week, had an interesting response for gamers who may not be fans of needing an always-on Internet connection.

"Fortunately we have a product for people who aren't able to get some form of connectivity, it's called Xbox 360," said Mattrick. "If you have zero access to the internet, that is an offline device."

Mattrick conveniently ignored the millions of gamers out there that may have slow or unstable Internet. The Xbox One requires authentication (phoning home) every 24 hours, even if you are playing in single player mode.

The company recently unveiled a slimmer, new form-factor Xbox 360 and announced hundreds of new games would still be headed to the console in the coming years, making it a perfectly usable platform.