Google Inc.

First, Facebook dethroned Google as the most trafficked web site in the United States, and now the social networking community has proven to have an extremely loyal following among news readers, potentially threatening the dominant position held by Google News. So says a recent Hitwise survey.

In the wake of the browser choice screen in Europe, Opera Software is reporting a dramatic uptick in browser downloads. The company said more than half the European downloads of Opera 10.50 have come directly from Microsoft's choice screen since early March.

Microsoft used to configure Internet Explorer as the default browser for its Windows operating system, but under pressure from the European Commission, it agreed last October to test-market measures to give Europeans an option to download and install competing browsers like Opera, Google's Chrome and Mozilla's Firefox.

Cybercriminals have been busy this week running scams that target Facebook users, college basketball fans, and celebrity gossip watchers. Security experts are warning about recent attacks with nasty payloads.

One widespread attack was a common ploy security researchers call the Facebook Password Reset Scam. The cybercriminals send an e-mail addressed to "user of Facebook" that reads, "Because of the measures taken to provide safety to our clients, your password has been changed. You can find your new password in the attached document."

Cybercriminals have been busy this week running scams that target Facebook users, college basketball fans, and celebrity gossip watchers. Security experts are warning about recent attacks with nasty payloads.

One widespread attack was a common ploy security researchers call the Facebook Password Reset Scam. The cybercriminals send an e-mail addressed to "user of Facebook" that reads, "Because of the measures taken to provide safety to our clients, your password has been changed. You can find your new password in the attached document."

With more than half its latest devices left on store shelves at the end of the third quarter, things may be getting out of hand for Palm as the manufacturer struggles to hold market share in the rapidly evolving telecom market.

The Viacom-Google battle over YouTube's alleged copyright infringement has been going on mostly behind the scenes for years. But court documents made public this week shed some light on the unfolding drama.

Viacom filed suit against Google in 2007 for allegedly allowing users to upload more than 100,000 videos clips containing copyrighted Viacom content, including parts of shows from MTV, Comedy Central, and Nickelodeon. The suit, which seeks $1 billion in damages, was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

HTC Corp., the Taiwanese cell phone maker sued by Apple for patent infringement, said Thursday it will defend itself against charges that it lifted iPhone technology.

In his first public comment on the suit, HTC chief Peter Chou said the company "disagrees with Apple's actions," though he did not go into specifics.

Apple says HTC's phones -- several of which use Google Inc.'s Android mobile operating software -- infringe on 20 of its patents. The patents cover technology like iPhone two-finger screen recognition, which allows users to perform multiple functions on the gadget.

The race to provide ultrafast broadband is on.

The race to provide ultrafast broadband is on. In May, Cleveland will become a test bed for a service, spearheaded by Case Western Reserve University, that lets residents of more than 100 homes download data at about 1 gigabit per second. In February, Google said it plans an ultra-high-speed broadband network covering as many as 500,000 users. "The purpose of this project is to experiment and learn," Google said in a blog introducing the idea. "Network providers are making real progress to expand and improve high-speed Internet access, but there's still more to be done." The U.S.

A back-and-forth battle is brewing between Internet search giant Google and media giant Viacom. Both companies are taking aggressive legal shots against each other after Viacom filed a copyright claim against Google's YouTube service.

Google has fired back, saying Viacom illegally uploaded videos to YouTube, according to documents filed with U.S. District Court in New York.