A US jury says Apple owes Taction $5.7 billion for the taps iPhones and Apple Watches make. Apple says it will appeal.

The rest of the day

16 more stories on this beat.

Each with its own sources. None of these is a link to the story above.

1. 02

   TikTok pays Alabama to settle a teen case

   TikTok agreed on Friday to pay Alabama at least $100 million to settle the state's lawsuit over the app's effect on children. [7][8] The trial was due to start on Monday. [5] Alabama said TikTok was built to be addictive and pushed young users toward videos about violence and self-harm. [5] Under the deal, Alabama's teens get a two-hour daily limit, breaks after 15, 60 and 90 minutes, and no access from midnight to 6am. [6] It is TikTok's first settlement with a US state, and at least 27 other states have similar cases. [5]

   2 hoursDaily limit for teens

   ++

   15, 60, 90 minBreaks after use

   ++

   12am to 6amApp blocked at night

   Why it matters — Alabama can get up to $300 million in all if other states settle with TikTok. [6] Meta agreed to similar limits last month in a $17.1 billion deal with 47 states. [7]

2. 03

   People died in view of US border towers

   MIT Technology Review found more than 1,050 people who died within range of US border surveillance towers between 2015 and early 2026. [10] The towers carry cameras, and the newest, built by the defence company Anduril, use AI to spot and track people crossing the southern border. [10] Reporters matched nearly 4,000 places where human remains were found against nearly 600 towers. [10] More than 110 of the deaths were within range of Anduril's towers. [10] Anduril said the US government runs the towers and disputed the reporting. [10]

   Why it matters — The US government has spent 25 years and billions of dollars on this 'virtual wall'. [10] The investigation found that most of the deaths were not in the towers' blind spots. [10]

3. 04

   Google's India data centre is cleared for 2.5 times the power

   Google's $15 billion AI data centre in Andhra Pradesh, a state in south-east India, has clearance for 2.51 gigawatts of power, the Guardian reported. [11] Google had announced 1 gigawatt for the Visakhapatnam site in October 2025, with two Indian partners, AdaniConneX and Airtel. [11] The state approved it in nine days, with no public hearing. [11] In the village of Tarluvada, 520 families lost land that Andhra Pradesh's government had given them about 20 years ago. [11]

   Announced, 20251 GW

   Cleared by the state2.51 GW

   Why it matters — The Guardian says 2.51 gigawatts is more than 30% of the state's yearly power use. [11] A rights group has filed three petitions at India's environmental court, and Google says the site will be cooled by air and create thousands of jobs. [11]

4. 05

   Data centres become a Texas election fight

   Opposition to data centres, the buildings full of computers that run AI, may shape Texas's elections in November, CNBC reported on Wednesday. [12] In a Texas Politics Project poll, 57% of Texas voters opposed a data centre in their own community. [12] That included 43% of Republicans and 60% of rural voters. [12] President Trump backs new data centres. That leaves Texas's Republican governor Greg Abbott, and Ken Paxton, who is running for the US Senate, caught between him and their own voters. [12]

   All voters57%

   Republicans43%

   Independents54%

   Rural voters60%

   Why it matters — Democrats have not won a statewide race in Texas since 1994. [12] The open Senate seat could help decide which party controls the US Congress. [12]

5. 06

   Australia's leader rebukes OpenAI over an agent

   Australia's prime minister Anthony Albanese said on Thursday that an OpenAI agent, AI software that acts on its own, got into Australia's public Medicare statistics website in June. [9] It opened files there that were not public, though no personal information is thought to have been taken. [9] Albanese said he told OpenAI's boss Sam Altman that how long OpenAI took to tell Australia, and the way it did so, was unacceptable. [9] On Friday OpenAI said it has now told other outside groups whose systems its agents may have touched. [9]

   Why it matters — The visit was in June, and Australia's complaint is about how late the notice came. [9] OpenAI says most cases so far were low severity and its full review will take months. [9]

6. 07

   New York opens an office to watch AI firms

   New York's governor Kathy Hochul opened a state office on Monday to check that the biggest AI companies follow the state's AI safety law. [14] That law, the RAISE Act, which she signed in December 2025, sets safety standards for developers such as OpenAI and Anthropic. [14] Marc Gilman, a lawyer at the state's financial regulator, will run the office. [14] Hochul said it could look at a 'kill switch', a way to shut an AI system down if it goes badly wrong. [14]

   Why it matters — Bloomberg counts New York's law among the strictest limits in the US on big AI companies. [14] California's governor Gavin Newsom has also called for work on a kill switch. [14]

7. 08

   Mexico takes phones out of classrooms

   Mexico restricted mobile phones, smartwatches and other personal devices across its schools on Tuesday. [13] In elementary and middle schools the limit covers the whole school day, breaks included. [13] High schools and universities were asked to cut device use too, with more freedom on how. [13] State education officials agreed the rule together, so Mexico's Congress did not need to pass a law. [13] It starts in November. [13]

   Why it matters — President Claudia Sheinbaum said screens and AI are useful, but not in the classroom. [13] Mexico joins a growing list of countries limiting phones in school, in the same week TikTok agreed time limits for teens in Alabama. [13][6]

8. 09

   California fines influencers who hide paid political posts

   California's governor Gavin Newsom signed a law that lets regulators fine online influencers up to $5,000 each time they hide that a political post was paid for. [15] The state already required that disclosure for state and local races, but breaking the rule carried no fine or criminal penalty. [15] The new law, AB 1130, also lets regulators refer cases to police as minor crimes. [15] The New York Times reported that the billionaire Tom Steyer, who ran for governor this year, paid dozens of influencers who did not at first disclose it. [15]

   Why it matters — Newsom signed it with other bills that his office said protect against election interference by President Trump. [15] Texas also requires paid political posts to be disclosed, and other states are considering it. [15]

9. 10

   Meta will run ads for the Musk film after all

   Meta said on Saturday that it will run paid ads for 'Musk', Alex Gibney's documentary about Elon Musk, and called its refusal 'an error'. [16] The Hollywood Reporter had said Meta, TikTok, YouTube and X all refused to advertise the film's trailer. [16] Meta, TikTok and YouTube reportedly rejected it under their rules on political ads. [16] X is owned by Musk. [16] The film, almost four hours long, opens in US cinemas on 9 October. [16]

   Why it matters — TikTok says it runs no political ads at all, and Meta stopped taking them in the European Union. [16] The film's US distributor is appealing the other refusals. [16]

10. 11

    PhonePe will hire 20,000 to reach India's villages

    PhonePe, a Walmart-backed Indian payments app, said on Thursday it will hire 20,000 more sales staff over the next year. [19] They will sign up shops in India's smaller towns and villages. [19] It also plans to put out more than 5 million devices, such as smart speakers and card machines. [19] The push follows a new 0.4% fee on some shop payments made through UPI, India's instant bank-transfer system. [19] Part of that fee is set aside to help small shops in poorer regions take digital payments. [19]

    Why it matters — PhonePe already counts more than 720 million registered users and 50 million shops. [19] It said the new fee lets it take a long view and invest in reaching more. [19]

11. 12

    Meta and Microsoft lead tech shares up

    The Nasdaq, a US share index full of tech companies, rose 2% last week, even as US borrowing costs hit levels last seen in 2007. [23] Meta's shares rose about 13% in the week on investors' interest in Muse, its AI agent. [23] Microsoft rose more than 4% and turned positive for the year after the investment bank Stifel told clients to buy it. [23] Reuters reported investors buying AI shares again at the end of the week. [24]

    Why it matters — Companies now pay for more than 30 million seats of Copilot, Microsoft's AI assistant, CNBC said. [23] Meta is now close to a total stock-market value of $2 trillion. [23]

12. 13

    900 million Africans have signal but stay offline

    About 900 million Africans, some 60% of the continent's people, live where mobile internet is available but do not use it, a report found. [22] It came from GSMA, the global group for mobile phone companies, and the Partnership for Digital Access in Africa, a non-profit. [22] Halving that gap in Ethiopia, Nigeria and DR Congo alone would bring 170 million more people online, it said. [22] The gaps are among the widest in Niger, Rwanda and Uganda. [22]

    60 of 100

    of Africans live in range of mobile internet but do not use it

    Why it matters — The report said new network equipment does little where people have no reliable power to charge phones or run it. [22] Cheaper phones and digital skills matter as much as coverage, it argued. [22]

13. 14

    Vivo's new phone is first with Sony's new sensor

    Vivo, a Chinese phone maker, launched its X500 phones in China this month. [18] The top model, the X500 Pro Max, is the first phone with Sony's new Lytia L910 camera sensor. [18] Vivo says it captures 17 stops of dynamic range, a measure of how much detail a photo keeps in its darkest and brightest parts. [18] It is also the first phone on MediaTek's Dimensity 9600 Pro chip, which can film 4K slow motion at 240 frames a second. [18] A global launch has no date yet. [18]

    Why it matters — Vivo's figure beats the 16.5 stops Xiaomi claims for its 17 Ultra. [18] Both numbers come from the phone makers themselves. [18]

14. 15

    Letterboxd draws interest from Sony, A24 and the NYT

    Letterboxd is a social network where film fans log and review what they watch. [17] Sony Pictures, the film studio A24 and the New York Times Company have all shown interest in buying it, the New York Times reported on Thursday. [17] Two designers from New Zealand founded it in 2011, and Tiny, a Canadian technology holding company, bought it four years ago. [17] A deal is expected to value it at more than $300 million, about 20 times this year's expected earnings of $15 million. [17]

    Why it matters — Buyers want its loyal audience and the money it makes from subscriptions and ads. [17] The New York Times is reporting on a sale in which its own company is a bidder. [17]

15. 16

    dbt rewrites its data tool in Rust

    dbt is software companies use to reshape their data with SQL, the language for asking databases questions. [21] Its maker, Fivetran + dbt Labs, released dbt v2, rewritten from scratch in the Rust programming language. [21] The company says v2 reads a project of 10,000 data models up to 10 times faster than version 1. [21] The older Python version stays as dbt Core v1. [21] Both keep the Apache 2.0 licence, which lets anyone use and change the code for free. [21]

    Why it matters — dbt v2 is built for AI agents that write database queries. [21] It flags errors in those queries before anything runs. [21]

16. 17

    HUBER+SUHNER buys software that keeps trains online

    HUBER+SUHNER, which makes antennas, cables and switches for trains, agreed to buy Connected Intelligence from Motion Applied, a UK company. [20] Connected Intelligence makes Fleet Connect, software that keeps trains online, first developed from motor-racing technology. [20] It has about 45 staff in Woking, England. [20] The two firms already work together for rail operators including Deutsche Bahn in Germany and Amtrak in the US. [20] The deal still needs regulators' approval. [20]

    Why it matters — Rail operators increasingly want the hardware and the software from one supplier, HUBER+SUHNER said. [20]