LG Electronics LG, which acquired WebOS from HP last year, says it’s working on a new version of the operating system for its next-generation of Smart TVs. LG is working on the new platform now and will unveil it sometime next year, Lee In-kyu, LG’s senior vice president of TV, told The Wall Street Journal …

From left: Beats co-founder Jimmy Iovine, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Beats co-founder Dr. Dre, and Apple SVP Eddy Cue. Apple The European Union’s competition watchdog, the European Commission, will make a decision on Apple’s $3 billion deal to buy Beats by the end of next month. The Commission announced the news Wednesday, saying that while it could clear the deal …

James Martin/CNET During the kickoff to its annual I/O developers conference, Google boasted of the success of its Android mobile operating system. The Android platform has 1 billion active monthly users, up from the 538 million active monthly users logged last year, Google’s Sundar Pichai said at the Google I/O conference Wednesday. By topping that figure, Android is now the …

Jay Greene/CNET Production on Apple’s next iPhone is starting to ramp up, according to a new report. Manufacturers Foxconn and Pegatron are on a hiring spree in China to get enough workers to build Apple’s next iPhone, Taiwan’s Economic Daily News is reporting. Hon Hai alone will be recruiting over 100,000 people in China to produce iPhones, according to Economic …

Brooke Crothers screen capture/Microsoft Microsoft’s Surface Mini, a smaller version of the company’s Surface Pro tablet, has once again surfaced. Only this time, Microsoft has done the leaking. Long-time Microsoft-tracker Paul Thurrott published a tweet on Friday, saying that “there are Surface Mini references all over the Surface Pro 3 User Guide.” CNET subsequently accessed and checked the User Guide …

The iPhone 5S already has a kill switch. Apple Microsoft and Google have signed an agreement with the New York Attorney General to add a “kill switch” to the next versions of Windows Phone and Android. Eric Schneiderman, the attorney general, released a report Thursday as part of his offices’s “Secure Our Smartphones” initiative. That report, which detailed the importance …

BlackBerry Z10 Josh Miller/CNET BlackBerry and Amazon have formed a strategic partnership that will see the Seattle e-commerce giant’s app marketplace make its way to BlackBerry devices. When the BlackBerry 10.3 mobile operating system launches this fall, users will have access to the Amazon Appstore, BlackBerry announced Wednesday. The move is meant to make BlackBerry devices more appealing to consumers …

Ooyala Smartphones and tablets are playing a key role in the consumption of online videos, a new study from video technology company Ooyala shows. During the first quarter of 2014, 21 percent of all online video-plays around the world were completed through mobile devices or tablets, Ooyala reported Wednesday. In the first quarter of 2012, that figure was at 3.4 …

AMC “Breaking Bad,” the wildly popular AMC series that ended its 62-episode run following Walter White and his meth-making enterprise last year, is rolling out in 4K Ultra HD on Netflix. Starting this week, Netflix users will be able to see every “Breaking Bad” episode in Ultra HD, joining and the “Moving Art” documentaries in Netflix’s stable of 4K programming. …

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos with Kindle HDX tablets. Amazon AT&T will have a hand in one of the most anticipated smartphone launches this year, according to a new report. The wireless carrier will be the exclusive provider of Amazon’s upcoming smartphone, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday, citing people who claim to have knowledge of the plans. It’s not clear …