China's leading e-commerce company Alibaba said Friday it will launch a mobile operating system, joining industry giants Google and Apple in providing software for smartphones.

The group will also unveil its first smartphone at the launch, to be held next week in Beijing, Alibaba spokeswoman Florence Shih told Agence France Presse by telephone from Hong Kong.

Look out Nokia, Angry Birds are plotting to knock you off your perch as Finland's top company.

Peter Vesterbacka, the chief marketing officer of Angry Birds creator Rovio, outlined the company's global ambitions during an appearance Thursday at the Fortune Brainstorm Tech conference in this Colorado ski resort.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is using Twitter as a tool to govern remotely while he undergoes cancer treatment in Cuba.

In more than 40 messages this week on his "chavezcandanga" account, he has approved money for a Caracas trash collection project, praised plans for a new park and cheered on the national soccer team.

Online groups startup Fridge said Thursday it has been bought by Google and will become part of the Internet giant's freshly-launched social network.

New York city-based Fridge is closing and its small staff will become part of the Google+ team, the startup said in a post at its website.

Australia on Thursday said it was considering upping the restrictions placed on Facebook, giving parents access to their children's pages and requiring proof of age at sign-up.

The social networking site has 10 million Australian users -- almost half the population -- and requires people to state at sign-up that they are at least 13, but there is currently no way to formally enforce the age limit.

Prince Albert II of Monaco has summoned journalists to castigate them for publishing "rumors" about his new marriage to Princess Charlene, saying someone in Monaco wanted to cause trouble.

"We want to express our indignation at these rumors," Albert, 53, told journalists from three local newspapers he called to the palace over stories about his marriage to South African Charlene Wittstock, 33.

China's passion for iPads and iPhones has triggered widespread cloning and even brawls. Now, it has gone further with a fake Apple store so convincing even the staff think they work for Steve Jobs.

The store, in the southwestern city of Kunming, was uncovered by an American blogger who was initially fooled, before she noticed not everything was as it seemed.

The Pentagon is asking scientists to figure out how to detect and counter propaganda on social media networks in the aftermath of Arab uprisings driven by Twitter and Facebook.

The U.S. military's high-tech research arm, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), has put out a request for experts to look at "a new science of social networks" that would attempt to get ahead of the curve of events unfolding on new media.

U.S. mobile security firm Lookout is teaming up with U.S. telecom giant Verizon Wireless to protect Smartphone users from hackers and scammers.

Lookout Mobile Security and Verizon announced at the Fortune Brainstorm Tech conference in Aspen, Colorado, on Wednesday that Lookout technology would be used to scan applications in Verizon's mobile storefront.

South Korea's Samsung Electronics launched a new version of its Galaxy Tab in its home market Wednesday in a bid to lure consumers away from Apple's iPad.

Samsung, the world's second-largest mobile phone maker, also said it would in August launch an updated version of its Galaxy S Smartphone in the U.S. market, which is dominated by Apple's iPhone.