Reuters

State attorney general said company secretly tracked users’ movements, searches, voiceprints and facial geometry

Google has agreed to pay $1.375bn in a settlement in principle reached with the state of Texas over allegations the company violated users’ data privacy, the Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, said on Friday.

The agreement settles two lawsuits that covered three products for allegedly violating Texas consumer protection laws.

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• 21-year-old wins stage two by 1sec; Roglic takes overall lead
• Demi Vollering retains La Vuelta Femenina title

Josh Tarling of Ineos Grenadiers set a time-trial pace even the race favourite, Primoz Roglic, could not match to win stage two of the Giro d’Italia by one second in Albania on Saturday. Tarling had a nervous wait before his first Grand Tour stage victory was confirmed as the 21-year-old Welshman watched Roglic come so close, but the Slovene had to settle for second place with the consolation of taking over the leader’s pink jersey for Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe.

San Francisco district judge says Congress did not authorize large-scale staffing cuts and restructuring of agencies

Donald Trump’s administration must temporarily halt its sweeping government overhaul because Congress did not authorize it to carry out large-scale staffing cuts and the restructuring of agencies, a federal judge in California said on Friday.

US district judge Susan Illston in San Francisco sided with a group of unions, non-profits and local governments in blocking large-scale mass layoffs known as “reductions in force” for 14 days.

Teal Health offers alternative to pap smear tests that need to be undertaken at a doctor’s office, slated for June rollout

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the first at-home test for cervical cancer screening, its maker Teal Health said on Friday, offering an alternative to smear tests that need to be undertaken at a doctor’s office.

Pap smear tests have significantly reduced cancer incidence from when they were first introduced 80 years ago. But they can be uncomfortable and inconvenient owing to the requirement for an in-clinic exam.

Founder and former CEO of bankruptcy lender pleaded guilty in December to securities and commodities fraud

Alex Mashinsky, the founder and former chief executive of the cryptocurrency lender Celsius Network, was sentenced on Thursday to 12 years in prison after pleading guilty in December to securities fraud and commodities fraud.

Mashinsky’s sentence was imposed by US District Judge John Koeltl in Manhattan, and is among the longest in a criminal case arising from the 2022 meltdown in cryptocurrency markets.

• Supporter with spare ticket took the bait over offer
• Around 50,000 supporters vying for just 480 seats

A Norwegian bartered five kilos of semi-dried fish for a ticket to Thursday’s semi-final clash between Bodø/Glimt and Tottenham in the Arctic Circle, as the hosts aim to become the first Norwegian club to reach a European final.

Some 50,000 fans were vying for just 480 remaining tickets to the second leg of Bodø/Glimt’s Europa League semi-final.

Damages awarded after earlier ruling found NSO unlawfully exploited a bug in WhatsApp to spy on users

Meta Platforms won a $168m verdict against the Israeli surveillance firm NSO, the company said on Tuesday, capping a six-year arm-wrestling match between the US’s biggest social-networking platform and the world’s best-known spyware company.

Meta had already won after a December ruling found that NSO had unlawfully exploited a bug in its messaging service WhatsApp to plant spy software on its users’ phones. On Tuesday, a jury in California ruled that NSO owed Meta $444,719 in compensatory damages – and $167.3m in punitive damages, Meta said.

Order to cancel 11 military aid flights – which were quickly reinstated – originated in defense head Pete Hegseth’s office

• US politics live – latest updates

Roughly a week after Donald Trump started his second term as president, the US military issued an order to three freight airlines operating out of Dover air force base in Delaware and a US base in Qatar: stop 11 flights loaded with artillery shells and other weaponry that were bound for Ukraine.

Lawsuit by Republican-led Missouri, Kansas and Idaho says FDA acted improperly by easing restrictions on abortion pill

Donald Trump’s administration on Monday pushed forward in defending US rules easing access to the abortion drug mifepristone from a legal challenge that began during Democratic former president Joe Biden’s administration.

The US Department of Justice in a brief filed in Texas federal court urged a judge to dismiss the lawsuit by three Republican-led states on procedural grounds.

Lawsuit also filed over administration’s cuts to health and human services that destroy life-saving programs

A coalition of Democratic state attorneys general sued on Monday in an attempt to block Donald Trump’s move to suspend leasing and permitting of new wind projects, saying it threatens to cripple the wind industry and a key source of clean energy.

Seventeen states and the District of Columbia argued, in a lawsuit filed in federal court in Boston, that the decision by the Republican president’s administration to indefinitely pause all federal wind-energy approvals was unlawful and must be blocked.