Paul Thurrott

Microsoft this week filed a federal lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice, alleging that the agency’s growing use of secrecy orders violates its rights, and its customers’ rights. Furthermore, Microsoft states that the legal statue that enables such secrecy orders is itself unconstitutional.

Hot on the heels of Microsoft’s recent announcement about its Bot Framework, Facebook this week revealed that it too would pervasively expand into bots, in this case with its popular Messenger app.

Microsoft this morning announced its support for the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield, which is designed to safeguard privacy as data is electronically transferred between the two jurisdictions. Put simply, the framework would require that these data protections will be identical to those within the EU.

Because my son just turned 18 and where does the time go, this edition of Short Takes focuses on Microsoft’s stock performance under Nadella, Microsoft’s connected car strategy, Verizon may actually buy Yahoo, FBI hack only works on old iPhones, and Telsa Model 3 pre-orders hit 325,000 units.

Two years after it should have purchased the HERE mapping and location offerings from Nokia, Microsoft may finally find itself (ahem) back in the driver’s seat: According to Daimler, the software giant is interested in a minority stake in HERE.

As tech enthusiasts, we often get bogged down in the details: A particular product release, a certain feature, the size of a smart phone screen. But at its Build 2016 opening keynote, Microsoft offered a broader vision for the future. Its future. And it’s customers’ futures.

The DOJ said that it had found a method of unlocking a terrorist’s iPhone. The action resulted in a temporary reprieve for Apple, which had fought helping the government. But it raises new questions about Apple’s security acumen.

Because yellow is the new purple, this edition of Short Takes focuses on Microsoft’s interest in the Yahoo sale, How Tay.ai became a hate-spewing, racist nightmare, insider trader at Microsoft settles with SEC, Apple sells Office 365, hackers swarm to help government hack the iPhone, and Gamestop is over-ripe.

Stung by its failure to maintain long-held processor development techniques, Intel has declared that the era of “tick-tock” is over, to be replaced by a slower-moving methodology it calls “Process-Architecture-Optimization.”

On a day in which Apple padded its product lineup with new models, the consumer electronics giant received a legal reprieve: The DOJ delayed a scheduled San Bernardino terrorism hearing, stating that it may have found a way to unlock the iPhone at the center of the case.

Because Spring is in the air but snow is in the forecast, this edition of Short Takes focuses on how Microsoft uses malware techniques with Windows 10 upgrade push, Azure isn’t scalable enough for Apple, a big Lenovo reorg, Zuckerberg jogs in the China smog, and more.

Apple is still fighting a hotly-debated legal battle over law enforcement requests to bypass encryption on its iPhone handsets. But the consumer electronics giant is also reportedly working to strengthen the security of iCloud, which is currently the weak link in Apple’s arsenal.