Guido Fawkes:

Ofcom boss Dame Melanie Dawes has admitted today that tech firms have paid just two of the eleven fines handed out under the Online Safety Act since March last year. Giving evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, she conceded nine remain unpaid, four of the offending sites have simply geo-blocked the UK, and three are still up and running with nothing changed.

Via Preston Byrne (Hacker News):

American courts have, by now, provided their preliminary view on the likelihood of Ofcom’s enforcement powers being successful in U.S. courts – the obiter dicta in 4chan v. Ofcom, the opinion in the case we filed against Ofcom in the federal District Court for the District of Columbia a little over a year ago.

[…]

Ofcom can’t enforce the Online Safety Act in America. Ofcom knows it, Ofcom has known it for a long time, and now, Ofcom has, finally, admitted it.

[…]

The GRANITE Act, a foreign censorship shield now before both the House and Senate (H.R. 10174 / S. 5478), is one proposed legal response America could adopt. The HOMEFRONT Act, H.R. 10309, is another. Either of GRANITE or HOMEFRONT would strip sovereign immunity from foreign censors and let Americans targeted by their orders drag those agencies into federal court, where they could be held accountable for their actions.

Previously:

• UK Child Protections and Messaging Backdoor
• Imgur Blocks UK Users Over Age Verification
• UK Online Safety Act
• UK Proposal to Weaken Messaging Security

The UK's competition regulator has proposed changes to make it easier and cheaper for companies to offer alternatives to Apple Pay on the iPhone (via Reuters).


The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) says Apple's fees and restrictions make it too difficult for rivals to launch contactless payment apps. Its proposals would give developers more ways to access the iPhone's NFC technology, which allows users to pay by holding their device near a payment terminal.

Apple opened up NFC access to developers in the UK in 2024, but companies must sign an agreement with Apple and pay fees. They also have to use the iPhone's Secure Element, which is a chip that stores sensitive information such as payment credentials.

The CMA wants Apple to also support host card emulation (HCE), an alternative that lets payment apps work without using the Secure Element. It also proposes rules that it expects would substantially lower Apple's access fees, although it would still allow the company to charge something.

Apple already offers HCE access for free in the European Union under commitments agreed in 2024. The CMA highlights that rival payment apps have since launched in the EU, while no competing wallet-type product has launched in the UK under Apple's current terms.

Apple told Reuters that developers can already offer contactless services using its technology:

We do not believe the CMA should require ​Apple to adopt an approach with lower privacy and security protections. We will continue to engage constructively to reach ​an outcome that is in the best interest of our users.

The CMA said the evidence it reviewed did not suggest either approach was inherently insecure. The proposals are open for consultation until November 17, 2026. The CMA will make a final decision after reviewing responses.
This article, "UK Proposes New Ways to Help Apple Pay Rivals" first appeared on MacRumors.com

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A fossilized braincase that sat in in the collection of the Natural History Museum in London for a century has been identified as Europe’s first megaraptoran dinosaur, a lineage once thought to have flourished mainly in the southern hemisphere.

The post New Species of Predatory Dinosaur Identified in UK appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Alexander Cohen:

The Post reported that UK security officials had issued such a TCN, in secret, in January 2025, requesting that Apple create a way to access encrypted iCloud data belonging not just to UK users, but to Apple users worldwide. The chutzpah of it all was astonishing.

Apple’s position (privately, since they were prohibited from commenting publicly on the reported TCN) showed fidelity to its previous stance: deliberately weakening end-to-end encryption, for whatever purpose or for whomever the intended beneficiary, would make every user less secure. So the dispute became the UK government saying it needed access, Apple saying it couldn’t decrypt the data, and the UK effectively replying: then change the system so that you can.

[…]

Faced with a legal order that would have required it to change the security architecture on which ADP depended, Apple found a third option: stop offering the feature that made this dilemma exist in the first place. It reverted affected UK iCloud data to Standard Data Protection, where Apple does hold the keys and can respond to lawful legal process (except the baseline categories that stay end-to-end encrypted either way). This satisfied the underlying legal requirement without ever building a ‘backdoor’.

Apple said the decision to withdraw ADP in the UK left them “gravely disappointed”. There was, however, an important disclaimer. Apple only stopped allowing new UK users to turn on Advanced Data Protection.

Apple:

For users in the UK who have already enabled Advanced Data Protection, Apple will soon provide additional guidance. Apple cannot disable ADP automatically for these users. Instead, UK users will be given a period of time to disable the feature themselves to keep using their iCloud account.

I wonder whether Apple will actually lock users out of their accounts if they don’t turn off ADP or whether they’ll quietly not enforce it like with Emergency SOS via satellite.

Cohen:

In July 2026, Apple lodged a fresh complaint at the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, which became public the following month. Then, on the 11th of September 2026, U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (a Democrat) and Republican Congressman Warren Davidson called on the UK’s Investigatory Powers Tribunal to open up its proceedings concerning Apple’s encrypted-data dispute.

[…]

On the 17th of September The Daily Telegraph reported that Apple had asked the Investigatory Powers Tribunal to remove restrictions that gag them from confirming the existence of the reported TCN.

Previously:

• UK Again Wants iCloud Backdoor
• UK Online Safety Act
• UK Backing Down on Apple Encryption Backdoor
• Apple Pulls iCloud Advanced Data Protection From UK
• UK Orders Apple to Break iCloud Advanced Data Protection