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In what amounted to little more than a botched robbery attempt, a man dressed in a white shirt and a white hooded mask crashed a stolen car through the front of an Apple Store in Greensboro, North Carolina.

A security guard described the man as white, and wearing a full "white ninja suit."

Nothing was taken from the store after the crash, and the guard says the ninja vanished from the scene immediately.

There was no other comment except to say that the car was a stolen Honda Accord from somewhere in the state and that the crash took place at 4:40 AM.

UK communications regulator warns that growth of 4G will cause TV reception problems for some Brits.

Ofcom will conduct a research program to figure out just how many people are likely to be affected. Currently, it puts the estimate at about 3 percent of people in the United Kingdom, but says using filters will solve the problem in most cases.

The problem has arisen becayse the chunk of spectrum reserved for 4G communications is next to that used for broadcasting digital terrestrial television. The 800MHz band is due to be auctioned off in 2012 and 4G services are expected to roll out in the country shortly after.

Signals from base stations might disrupt television viewing for as many as 760,000 people to some degree, Ofcom has warned. The regulator is considering running a public educational campaign to alert viewers that they may be affected, and how to deal with it if they are.

Firms that win licenses for the 800MHz spectrum will have to contribute to the cost of the campaign.

For the vast majority of affected viewers, filters should easily solve the problems, but in very very few cases, viewers may need to find alternative ways to watch digital TV.

Technology giant reveals new set of predictions.

Cisco has said that the proliferation of Tablet PC devices, smartphones and other gear will boost the number of Internet-connected devices to over 15 billion by the year 2015. This, in turn, will drive up Internet traffic to an astonishing 966 exabytes (one quintillion bytes) a year.

Consumer video content will dominate this Internet traffic. According to Cisco, by 2015, one million minutes of video content will be watched by Internet users per second. About 40 percent of the world's population will be online by that time, Cisco predicts.

If this outlook is correct, it brings up some worrying concerns that experts and industry insiders have warned about for many years now.

"What you are seeing is this massive growth in devices, the way devices are being used and are connected to the internet and what users expect them to do," said Suraj Shetty, Cisco vice president for global marketing.

"All this is putting a lot of pressure on the internet and the next generation internet faces issues handling not just the proliferation of these devices but how they are going to grow and be intelligent enough to be connected to you. The most important question we face is how to manage all this traffic intelligently."

Speculation has begun to crop up that Sony may be looking to buy Netflix or IMAX, two extremely high-profile companies, in an effort to boost revenue.

Reports claim Sony is already negotiating a bid for IMAX, but others believe Netflix would be an equally attractive acquisition.

IMAX, while a cash cow, would be hard to integrate to Sony's existing products (outside of Sony Pictures) whereas on the other hand Netflix better integrates into the PS3, HDTVs and other Web-connected devices that have become Sony's bread and butter.

According to merger arbitrage specialist Sachin Shah, Sony has:

A lot of cash on their balance sheet to put to work if they wanted to. They could do multiple deals and it could start becoming exciting for shareholders.

It’s hard for me to believe that these guys have destroyed that much value in such a short time. Stringer really has to do something to revitalize the company. For Sony to continue to compete, they’re going to have to start doing deals.

comScore has posted new figures for U.S. smartphone market share and to no one's surprise, Android continues to surge at the expense of RIM.

Android jumped to 36.4 percent share for the quarter ended April 30th, from 31.2 percent share in the quarter before it.

Apple moved to second place with 26 percent share, up from 24.7 percent in the quarter before it.

RIM saw the weakest move, falling to 25.7 percent share from 30.4 percent.

Microsoft, who just released Windows Phone 7 during the period, fell from 8 percent to 6.7.

Overall, there were 74.6 million smartphone owners in the US for the latest period, up 13 percent from the previous quarter.

Microsoft has confirmed that it will be killing off support for Windows Mobile 6.x phones starting on July 15th.

Developers can still create apps for the WM6 marketplace and users will be able to download them forever, or until the marketplace is shut down.

Those same developers are angry however, as Microsoft pulling support of the devices leaves little reason for users to download new apps if they will be upgrading their devices in the near future.

Some have questioned the move as recent data suggests WM6 is still selling better than new Windows Phone 7 devices, at least in the last quarter.

Electronic Arts is just about ready to launch its own digital distribution platform, one that will rival Valve's popular Steam.

The new platform will be dubbed "Origin" and will allow customers to "purchase, download and keep track of their games."

EA's Origin store could launch with upwards of 150 titles including the new Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO, which is exclusively digital.

Additionally, the platform will add "Facebook-like social features," although it is unclear what those will be.

The official announcement is expected later today.

Police return MacBook to man who kept tabs on thief's activities.

Joshua Kaufman, of Oakland, California, had his MacBook stolen from his apartment after a break in on March 21. When he realized the MacBook was gone, he took advantage of an anti-theft application called Hidden which let him see images from the webcam, as well as content on the screen.

He originally took the evidence to the police, but due to resource restrictions, they were unable to help him even though he had photos of somebody using his MacBook.

Kaufman then took his campaign online to a blog, where he posted several images he had gotten back from his MacBook. Oakland police got in contact with him soon after and got to the task of attempting to track down the individual in the photos, which didn't take long with the mountain of evidence Kaufman already had.

"Update: (May 31, 8:37 PM PST) ARRESTED! An Oakland police officer just called me to let me know that they arrested the guy in my photos! BOOYA! The police used my evidence (email which pointed to a cab service) that he was a driver and tricked him into picking them up. Nice work OPD!" he posted to his blog.

DVD rental and video streaming heavyweight expects large price tag to retain TV Shows and Films.

A deal between Netflix and Liberty Media's Starz network is set to expire early next year. It was originally struck four years ago, costing Netflix $30 million. Starz has the online distribution rights to content from Walt Disney Co and Sony Corp's Sony Pictures.

Netflix now has more than 23 million customers in the United States. It's video streaming service has gained considerable popularity, largely due to its integration with many different platforms (game consoles etc.).

To renew a deal with Starz is certainly going to cost considerably more than $30 million. When asked if the deal could cost up to $200 million, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said that would not be shocking.

"We are paying more for content every time we renew," Hastings said about striking new content agreements. "We view that as a positive." Netflix is aggressively pursuing content deals to keep customers happy, targeting popular content such as Glee.

Google halts effort to access content in hundreds of GMail accounts.

Google Inc. revealed earlier this week that an attack on its GMail service originated from Jinan, Shandong province, China. Hackers attempted to break into hundreds of different GMail accounts, held by senior U.S. Government officials, Chinese activists and others.

Google said it detected and disrupted the attempts. "We recently uncovered a campaign to collect user passwords, likely through phishing," Google said on Thursday. "The goal of this effort seems to have been to monitor the contents of these users' emails."

South Korean officials also appeared to be targets of the campaign.

Google's announcement comes a year after it disclosed a cyberattack on its systems in China, an event that led to Google downsizing its presence in the market.

"Investors would like to see Google figure out a way to operate in China, and capitalize on the growth of the country," said Cowen and Co analyst Jim Friedland. "It's been a tough relationship. And this highlights that it continues to be a tough relationship."

Chief Executive says door is open to licensing operating system to other companies.

When Hewlett-Packard Co acquired Palm, one of the biggest factors in that decision was the WebOS rights. The mobile operating system has been repeatedly praised for what it offers to the market, and its acquisition by HP gave the consumer electronics company a weapon in the mobile space.

Instead of just putting WebOS on HP products, the company is open to licensing its use to other companies too. "I happen to believe that WebOS is a uniquely outstanding operating system," said HP chief executive Leo Apotheker. "It's not correct to believe that it should only be on HP devices."

HP is preparing to launch its 9.7-inch TouchPad tablet, which is based on WebOS software. It hopes that WebOS will become the third most used operating system software in the space, behind Google's Android and Apple's iOS.

"Right now we are focused on getting it out in the market to gain the credibility," Apotheker said. "WebOS will also be adopted by many partners who provide services to small and medium businesses."

Groupon has filed for an IPO today, looking to raise $750 million in its first sale.

Trading under the ticker "GRPN," the gigantic daily deal site will likely go public within weeks.

The company has raised $1 billion from private investors after being founded in 2008 and has seen explosive growth since then.

CEO Andrew Mason did note, however, that the company has seen massive losses in the last two years and the losses will continue into the foreseeable future as they "continue to invest in growth."

In 2010, Groupon had revenue of $713 million and recorded a net loss of $456 million. For the first quarter of 2011, revenue exploded to $644.7 million, but losses remained, with a net loss of $147 million for the quarter.

Adds the CEO:

We anticipate that our operating expenses will increase substantially in the foreseeable future as we continue to invest to increase our subscriber base, increase the number and variety of deals we offer each day, expand our marketing channels, expand our operations, hire additional employees and develop our technology platform.

The hacking group that took down PBS earlier this week has hacked Sony and posted the info online, adding another chapter to the long saga of security breaches that have plagued the company since April.

"LulzSec" posted that they broke into the servers of Sony Pictures Entertainment websites and stole personal info for 1 million customers.

The group then posted names, addresses, emails and passwords for some customers on the Internet, bashing Sony in the process.

Says the group:

From a single injection, we accessed EVERYTHING. Why do you put such faith in a company that allows itself to become open to these simple attacks?

At 6 serious attacks and 102 million user's info stolen in 2 months, Sony has become a massive target for hacking groups and it has hurt the bottom line. The company said last month that the attacks would lead to a $170 million writedown in the current quarter.

The Shanghai Daily has reported today that 17-year-old teenager Anhui Province Zheng sold his kidney to be able to purchase an Apple iPad 2.

Zheng sold his kidney for about $3000 USD, but says now that his health is worsening.

"I wanted to buy an iPad 2 but could not afford it. A broker contacted me on the Internet and said he could help me sell one kidney for 20,000 yuan," says the teen.

The hospital in which his surgery was performed did not meet safety qualifications for organ removal/transplants but claimed they knew nothing of the surgery after police probed them.

After selling the kidney, Zheng bought an iPad 2 and an iPhone but when pressed by his mother as to where he got them he explained the surgery.

The video is in Chinese but you can see his scar:

According to the June 1st stats from Net Applications, Internet Explorer continues to see their global browser market share fall, mainly at the hands of Google's Chrome.

IE, in all variations fell to 52.87 percent market share, with Internet Explorer 8 being the largest part of that share at 31.28 percent. Microsoft's latest, IE9, jumped to 4.19 percent despite not being available to Windows XP users.

Newly launched Firefox 4 already beat out Firefox 3.6, at 10.08 percent to 9.14 percent. Altogether, Firefox accounted for 21 percent share.

Google's Chrome moved to 11.86 percent share, with Chrome 11 leading the way.