South Korea's privacy watchdog has fined Google and Meta a combined 100 billion won ($72 million) for tracking consumers' online behavior without their consent and using their data for targeted advertisements.

South Korea's Personal Information and Protection Commission said it fined Google 69.2 billion won ($50 million) and Meta 30.8 billion won ($22 million) after a meeting where officials agreed that the companies' business practices might cause "serious" privacy infringements.

U.S. inflation is showing signs of entering a more stubborn phase that will likely require drastic action by the Federal Reserve, a shift that has panicked financial markets and heightens the risks of a recession.

Some of the longtime drivers of higher inflation — spiking gas prices, supply chain snarls, soaring used-car prices — are fading. Yet underlying measures of inflation are actually worsening.

The European Commission on Wednesday set out proposals to bring down the soaring price of gas and electricity in the EU, notably by taxing excess profits of power producers.

EU energy ministers are to review the plans in an extraordinary meeting in Brussels on September 30.

Stock markets hit reverse while the dollar shot higher Tuesday after data showed that U.S. inflation slowed less than expected.

They literally run the country.

In parking lots, on flatbed trucks, hospital courtyards and rooftops, private generators are ubiquitous in parts of the Middle East, spewing hazardous fumes into homes and businesses 24 hours a day.

Lebanon's central bank lifted its remaining subsidies on fuel on Monday, gas station owners said, ending a year-long process of scaling back on the expensive program.

The Central Bank over a year ago announced it would gradually lift fuel subsidies, to slow down the draining of its foreign exchange reserves. Fuel subsidies once cost the cash-strapped country some $3 billion annually. Last week, it subsidized just 20% of the cost of fuel imports.

Thanks to solar energy, residents of the northern Lebanese village of Toula are finally able to enjoy ice cream again -- a treat in a sun-baked country plagued by power cuts.

Lebanon’s Economic Committees, a grouping of Lebanon's main businessmen and owners of major firms, on Thursday proposed an economic recovery plan that entails recovering 74% of the funds of bank depositors.

Caretaker PM and PM-designate Najib Mikati has “finally” won a U.S. green light to accept the Iranian fuel grant and Washington has made the condition that “there should be no political communication over the matter,” al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Thursday.

New British Prime Minister Liz Truss on Thursday said domestic fuel bills would be frozen for two years, marking her first week in office with a costly plan to tackle a politically perilous cost-of-living crisis.