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The Department of Justice has begun an initial review to determine whether large U.S. telecom companies such as AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. have abused the market power they've amassed in recent years. The DOJ's antitrust chief has said she wants to reassert the government's role in policing monopolistic and anti-competitive practices by powerful companies.

The Iranian regime has developed one of the world's most sophisticated mechanisms for controlling and censoring the Internet. The Iranian government appears to be engaging in a practice often called deep packet inspection. The monitoring capability was provided, at least in part, by a joint venture of Siemens AG, the German conglomerate, and Nokia Corp., the Finnish cellphone company.

After meeting with managers of the Chinese operations of Google on Thursday to warn them, the Chinese government disabled some search functions on the Chinese-language Web site of Google on Friday. Officials alleged the site was linking too often to pornographic and vulgar content.

Skype's application for the Apple iPhone is igniting network neutrality disputes around the globe after less than a week on the market. Free Press, asked the US Federal Communications Commission to investigate whether AT&T was violating US guidelines by preventing the app from running on its 3G network. An alliance of internet groups on Friday responded to Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile's threat to block the Skype for iPhone application on its network.

The Internet is no longer just an essential channel for commerce, entertainment and information. It has also become a stage for state control - and rebellion against it. Computers are becoming more crucial in global conflicts, not only in spying and military action, but also in determining what information reaches people around the globe.

The European Commission threatened Britain with sanctions on Tuesday for allowing use of a new advertising technology, created by Phorm, to track the Web movements of customers. The country's largest service provider, BT, acknowledged last April that it used the tool without customers' consent in 2006 and 2007.

Google's Street View mapping project ran into local opposition in England, with angry residents in the village of Milton Keynes blocking a Google driver when he started taking photographs of their homes. Villagers accused the company of going too far, violating their privacy and possibly facilitating crime.

With the economy weakening, chief executives want Wall Street to see them as tough cost-cutters who are not afraid to lay off workers. Big companies also routinely carry out scattered layoffs that are small enough to stay under the radar, contributing to an unemployment rate that keeps climbing. I.B.M. is one such company.

Two more Putnam County voters - Martha Louise Harrington and Michael K. Koon - have come forward about problems they experienced on early-voting electronic machines at the Winfield courthouse.

The Bush administration's wiretapping program has come under new scrutiny. Two influential congressional committees have opened probes into allegations US intelligence spied on the phone calls of U.S. military personnel, journalists and aid workers in Iraq. James Bamford discusses the NSA's domestic sprying, the agency's failings pre-9/11 and the ties between NSA and the nation's telecommunications companies.