Hasta La Gadget!

If you think you had a bad week, spare a thought for the folk at EA. With SimCity’s launch thoroughly bungled, it’s left for us to pick up the pieces and try and make sense of it all. Not every story casts a gloomy shadow this week, there’s the imminent army of One Direction figurines on their way to cheer us up. Find out how and when in the Eurocast below.

Hosts: Dan Cooper, Sharif Sakr, Steve Dent

Producer: James Trew

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EU competition police have handed Microsoft an enormous $730m fine, after the software giant admitted that a “technical error” saw new Windows machines arriving without the option to choose a default web browser. More »

If podcasts were cookies — or as our hosts say, biscuits — this week’s would be an Oreo. Two strong, independent, yet wonderfully united sections. The first part of the experience is firm, trustworthy yet exciting, before giving way to a soft, sugary, all american finale. Glass of milk optional.

Hosts: Dan Cooper, Mat Smith

Guest: Ben Gilbert

Producer: James Trew

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European Union regulators weren’t exactly content with Google after it rolled up most of its privacy policies into a monolithic document early last year, and it doesn’t seem like that’s about to change. After giving Page and Co. four months to respond to 12 recommendations regarding its new policy, French regulator CNIL has come to the conclusion that “Google did not provide any precise and effective answers.” Though EU officials aren’t happy with Mountain View’s responses, Google says its policies respect European law and that it replied with steps to address the concerns by the January 8th deadline. Still, data protection regulators are committed to their investigation and are aiming to form a group before the summertime that would respond to the search titan.

Filed under: Internet, Google

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Source: Reuters

After landing itself in hot water with the Irish Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) and Hamburg’s Data Protection Authority (DPA), Facebook has deleted all of its European photo tagging facial recognition data. After reviewing the company’s source code and deletion process, DPC spokesperson Ciara O’Sullivan confirmed today that the regulatory agency was satisfied with the social network’s compliance. Additional removal confirmation came from Hamburg’s DPC’s technical department, which also reviewed the firm’s software to ensure that its standards were met. In a recent comment to CFO World, a Facebook spokesperson confirmed that the data had been deleted and that the social network has no plans to reinstate facial recognition software in Europe anytime soon. No word on whether Facebook will now purchase sadface.com for… oh, $80 million or so.

Filed under: Software, Facebook

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Source: CFO World