Nokia and Microsoft plan to invest €18 million ($24 million) in promoting research into mobile applications for phones running Windows software and Nokia platforms.

Aalto University in Helsinki says the AppCampus program will be launched at the university in May with each company investing up to €9 million over the next three years.

Chinese telecoms giant Huawei on Tuesday hit back at claims it was a security risk following its barring from Australia's broadband rollout, with one director labeling it "complete nonsense".

Huawei, among the world's top makers of telecommunications equipment, has been blocked from bidding for contracts on Australia's ambitious Aus$36 billion (US$38 billion) broadband plan due to fears of Chinese cyber-attacks.

Taiwan's HTC on Monday unveiled the smartphones that it said would allow users to "retire" their digital cameras, as it sought to fight back against rivals Apple and Samsung.

The "One" series of phones, which will hit Asian markets on April 2, have cameras that can autofocus in just 0.2 seconds, making them the equal of many modern digital cameras, the company said.

Under the patronage of the President of the Republic of Lebanon, Michel Suleiman, represented by the Minister of Telecommunications, Nicolas Sehnaoui, and with the participation of H.E. Riad Salameh, Governor of the Central Bank of Lebanon, the third annual ArabNet Digital Summit is set to open on Thursday, March 29th at the Grand Habtoor Hotel, Beirut. The Summit is the largest gathering of entrepreneurs and digital professionals in the web and mobile industries in the Arab region and is expected to attract 1,500 attendees for five action packed days of innovation, entrepreneurialism and best practice sharing between regional and global leaders.

In collaboration with the Central Bank of Lebanon and strategic partnerships with Bank Audi, STC, and MBC Group—the summit will feature discussions and lectures involving 150 internationally renowned speakers covering the latest trends and topics in the industry, particularly in relation to the opportunities and challenges created in various industries by the digital revolution. This will include the future of news, television, advertising and digital marketing, as well as mobile applications, online gaming, e-commerce, and other important fields.

A prominent lawmaker and gay rights activist in Nepal says he has asked Facebook to include a third option for people who do not identify themselves as male or female.

Sunilbabu Pant said he has written to Facebook founders Mark Zuckerberg and Chris Hughes asking an option as "third gender" or "others" when signing up because people who do not identify as male or female continue to be sidelined by Facebook's options.

Yahoo! on Sunday announced the appointment of three independent board members as the struggling Internet firm moved to shake up its team and fend off a challenge from an activist hedge fund.

But the hedge fund seeking to wrest control of the firm said it was disappointed with the move, and would press its case to shareholders.

A Japanese court has ordered search giant Google to suspend its auto-complete function because it breaches one man's privacy, his lawyer said.

Tokyo District Court approved a petition by the man, who claimed typing his name into the search engine generated a suggestion linking him to crimes he did not commit, lawyer Hiroyuki Tomita told media Sunday.

When Phong Yang, a Hmong refugee from Laos, landed in California's Central Valley — via stops in Thailand and France — he was 14 years old. He learned to speak Hmong from his parents, but today he has a hard time teaching the language to his children, who are distracted by cell phones and computers.

Many Hmong are losing their language, Yang said, leading to fears that their cultural identity will be lost.

Electric car owners who prided themselves on being green now find themselves in a bind as Japan's government maneuvers to restart dozens of nuclear power plants idled after last year's meltdowns.

For decades, nuclear generation has been a crucial source of power here. But the tsunami-triggered meltdowns at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant have spurred a national debate over how to supply Japan's electricity in the future.

The Huffington Post will soon be available in a weekly magazine version for the iPad, president and editor-in-chief Arianna Huffington confirmed at a media summit in Toronto.

It "will be a weekly magazine version with the best of the original reporting and the best of blogs and the best of video that we produce," Huffington said Thursday, adding the magazine would launch next month.