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Israel's Cellebrite, a provider of mobile forensic software, is helping the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation's attempt to unlock an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino, California shooters, the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper reported on Wednesday. If Cellebrite succeeds, then the FBI will no longer need the help of Apple Inc , the Israeli daily said, citing unnamed industry sources. Apple is engaged in a legal battle with the U.S. Justice Department over a judge's order that it write new software to disable passcode protection on the iPhone used by the shooter.

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U.S. prosecutors said Monday that a “third party” had presented a possible method for opening an encrypted iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters, a development that could bring an abrupt end to the high-stakes legal showdown between the government and Apple Inc. A federal judge in Riverside, California, late Monday agreed to the government's request to postpone a hearing scheduled for Tuesday so that prosecutors could try the newly discovered technique. The Justice Department said it would update the court on April 5. The government had insisted until Monday that it had no way to access the phone used by Rizwan Farook, one of the two killers in the December massacre in San Bernardino, California, except to force Apple to write new software that would disable the password protection.

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By Matthew Miller and Paul Carsten BEIJING (Reuters) – Facebook's co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg met China's propaganda tsar Liu Yunshan in Beijing on Saturday as part of a charm offensive in one of the few markets where the social network cannot be accessed. The rare meeting, reported by China's state news agency Xinhua, suggests warming relations between Facebook and the Chinese government, even as Beijing steps up censorship of and control over the Internet.

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By Dustin Volz WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. government and Apple Inc will be able to cross-examine the other's witnesses in a court hearing next week on whether the technology company must help federal investigators unlock an encrypted iPhone tied to one of the San Bernardino killers, Apple said. The hearing, set for Tuesday, is the latest development in a showdown between Apple and the government that has become a lightning rod in the national debate over digital privacy and what kind of data on phones and personal devices should be accessible to law enforcement. All the witnesses have given written declarations in the legal briefs already filed in the case, said an Apple lawyer who spoke to reporters on a conference call on Friday, on condition of anonymity.

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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.

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By Caroline Copley HANOVER, Germany (Reuters) – It's not just computers and mobile phones that are vulnerable to cyber attack, according to software firm Trend Micro. As more devices are hooked up to the Internet, it could be anything from medical equipment to industrial machinery – and even sex toys. To illustrate the point, Trend Micro spokesman Udo Schneider surprised journalists at a news conference this week by placing a large, neon-pink vibrator on the desk in front of him and then bringing it to life by typing out a few lines of code on his laptop.

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BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – The logistics arm of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd has completed a funding round, China's biggest e-commerce company said on Monday. Investors in the funding round of Cainiao include Singapore's Temasek Holdings [TEM.UL] and GIC Pte Ltd [GIC.UL], Malaysia's Khazanah Nasional Bhd [KHAZA.UL], and China's Primavera Capital, Alibaba said in a statement. Alibaba did not disclose details of how much money Cainiao raised, whether it issued equity shares, or at how much the logistics unit is now valued. …

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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.

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The U.S. Justice Department on Thursday said Apple Inc's rhetoric was “false” in a high-profile fight over the government's bid to unlock an encrypted iPhone belonging to one of the San Bernardino shooters. Last month, the 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. Apple has not complied.

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FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Facebook's “Like” button violates German and European privacy laws in a case brought by a consumer group against an online shopping site which relied on the user recommendation feature, a Dusseldorf regional court said on Wednesday. The ruling followed a complaint by the Nordrhein-Westfalen Consumer Association against a shopping site owned by German department store chain Peek & Cloppenburg KG Duesseldorf, for using the Facebook feature without appropriate user consent. (Reporting By Eric Auchard and Harro ten Wolde in Frankfurt; Editing by Edward Taylor)