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Apple Inc Chief Executive Tim Cook plans to visit Beijing later this month to meet high-level government officials, at a time when it is facing some setbacks in its most important overseas market, a source familiar with the matter said. Cook has frequently traveled to China since taking the helm of Apple five years ago, but his latest visit comes during a critical period. Last week, billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn said in an interview with cable television network CNBC that he had sold his entire stake in Apple, citing China's economic slowdown and worries about whether the government could make it very difficult for Apple to conduct business.

By Alex Dobuzinskis LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A cellphone expert overrode the lock function on an Apple iPhone to help Los Angeles police in a homicide investigation around the time U.S. authorities were battling the company to open other phones in criminal cases, court records showed on Thursday. The successful hack of the iPhone 5s in the Los Angeles case is another sign U.S. authorities are turning to third-party contractors to unlock smartphones rather than relying on manufacturers like Apple Inc , which helped in the past. The third-party hacks have Apple racing to strengthen its encryption technology.

By Himank Sharma MUMBAI (Reuters) – India has rejected a plan by Apple Inc to import used iPhones, government officials said on Wednesday, a blow to the U.S. tech giant that has been seeking to revive waning sales of its flagship smartphones. Apple sells what it calls refurbished iPhones at a discount in some countries, including the United States. Extending this practice to India would have likely helped it increase its share in one of the world's fastest growing smartphone markets against competitors with much cheaper offerings.

The attackers who stole $81 million from the Bangladesh central bank probably hacked into software from the SWIFT financial platform that is at the heart of the global financial system, said security researchers at British defense contractor BAE Systems. SWIFT, a cooperative owned by 3,000 financial institutions, confirmed to Reuters that it was aware of malware targeting its client software. Its spokeswoman Natasha Deteran said SWIFT would release on Monday a software update to thwart the malware, along with a special warning for financial institutions to scrutinize their security procedures.

(Reuters) – Verizon Communications Inc said an attacker had exploited a security vulnerability on its enterprise client portal to steal contact information of a number of customers. The company said the attacker however did not gain access to Customer Proprietary Network Information (CPNI) or other data. Krebs On Security, which first broke the news of the breach, said a member of a underground cybercrime forum had posted a new thread advertising the sale of a database containing the contact information on some 1.5 million customers of Verizon Enterprise.

A German court has ruled against Apple Inc in a case over video streaming patents, handing Kudelski's OpenTV unit a victory in its ongoing intellectual property licensing campaign against major technology companies. OpenTV sued Apple in 2014, alleging that various products infringe its patents, including the iPhone and iPad. The ruling on Tuesday from the Dusseldorf District Court said Apple products sold in Germany must not use streaming software which infringes OpenTV's patents.

Britain said it will begin trialing driverless cars on motorways for the first time in 2017, as it moves toward its goal of allowing autonomous cars to take to the streets by 2020. The government said last year there were no legal barriers to the technology being tested and gave the go-ahead for vehicle trials to start on some local roads. Finance minister George Osborne will announce plans on Wednesday to test vehicles on motorways and say the government will bring forward proposals to remove regulatory barriers to the technology, the Treasury said.

By Alexandria Sage and Paul Lienert SAN FRANCISCO/DETROIT(Reuters) – Google's self-driving car team is expanding and hiring more people with automotive industry expertise, underscoring the company's determination to move the division past the experimental stage. The operation now employs at least 170 workers, according to a Reuters review of their profiles on LinkedIn, the business-oriented social network. Many are software and systems engineers, and some come from other departments at Google.

By Julia Harte and Julia Edwards WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey told a congressional panel on Tuesday that a court order forcing Apple Inc to give the FBI data from an iPhone belonging to one of the San Bernardino shooters would be “potentially precedential” in other cases where the agency might request similar cooperation from technology companies. The remarks are a slight change to Comey's statement last week that forcing Apple to unlock the phone was “unlikely to be a trailblazer” for setting a precedent for other cases. The issue of precedent is central in the public fight between Apple and the U.S. government over the shooter's iPhone, which Apple has cast as a pivotal case that could lead to loss of privacy for all its customers and should be decided by Congress rather than a court.

Apple Inc on Thursday struck back in court against a U.S. government demand that it unlock an encrypted iPhone belonging to one of the San Bernardino shooters, arguing such a move would violate its free speech rights and override the will of Congress. The high-stakes fight between Apple and the government burst into the open last week when the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation obtained a court order requiring Apple to write new software and take other measures to disable passcode protection and allow access to shooter Rizwan Farook's iPhone. The clash has driven to the heart of a long-running debate over how much law enforcement and intelligence officials should be able to monitor digital communications.