Apple

A jury on Tuesday unanimously found Apple not guilty in the decade old antitrust suit that accused Apple of creating a monopoly through iTunes updates that disallowed music purchased from competitors.

At issue were iPods issued from 2006 through 2009, which the plaintiffs argued would only play music purchased on iTunes or downloaded from CDs, not music purchased from competing services. Apple argued that its updated iTunes version found on the devices aimed to increase security and create a better experience for iPod users.

No major news came out of Cupertino last week, but there were several noteworthy items. Topping the list was the release of iOS 8.1.2 on Tuesday, which fixed a bug that caused purchased ringtones to disappear from people's devices. Although Apple has not divulged the update's security content (if there was any), it apparently did not patch the TaiG jailbreak.

A day after the 8.1.2 update, Apple released the iOS 8.2 beta 2 to developers. The update mainly pertains to the WatchKit SDK, including some new features for the API and some bug fixes.

Apple and IBM first joined forces in July, when they announced their partnership in an effort to "transform enterprise mobility" by building and expanding industry specific iOS applications and supporting cloud services.

Described by Bridget van Kralingen, SVP of IBM World Business Services, the collaboration "aims directly at the new quest of business—smart technologies that unlock new value at the intersection of big data and individual engagement, [and] combines IBM’s industry expertise and unmatched position in enterprise computing, with Apple’s legendary user experience and excellence in product design to lift the performance of a new generation of business professionals.”

Apple officially released iOS 8.1.1 last week. The update improves performance on older hardware like the iPhone 4s and iPad 2, but it also patches some of the exploits used by Pangu's jailbreak.

Pangu, however, is working on an iOS 8.1.1 jailbreak, and currently has one that works on 30-pin devices (which predates the lightning connector). The team demoed it on an iPad 3.

With Black Friday just two weeks away, many retailers last week started announcing holiday shopping deals on Apple products. Walmart, Best Buy, Staples and Target, among others, will be offering discounts on select iPhone and iPad models, as well as Beats products for the biggest shopping day of the year. Aside from discounts, many of the chains will also offer rebates in the form of gift cards.

According to a Thursday report from the Wall Street Journal, the Department of Justice has had a program in place since 2007 that uses fake cell phone towers to locate people. The fake towers are actually Boeing-made devices know as "dirtboxes" that are mounted on small aircraft. By flying around and picking up a signal from the target's cell phone, the target's location can quickly be triangulated. According to the DoJ, non-target signals are "let go."