Bonn, Germany  - German's main competition agency, the Federal Cartel Office, fined US software company Microsoft 9 million euros (12 million dollars) Wednesday for imposing a retail price for its Office Home & Student 2007 software.

Microsoft said it would pay the fine to avoid a lengthy legal dispute and was reviewing its internal processes in Germany to ensure they complied with German law in future.

New York - Cyber spies from China, Russia and elsewhere have infiltrated the US electrical grid and other key infrastructures and have the ability to disrupt them during a crisis or war, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

Quoting current and former national-security officials, the report said that the intruders haven't sought to damage the power grid or other key infrastructure yet, but had laid the groundwork to do so in the future.

New York - Going to the doctor could become a thing of the past for many people if the telemedicine plans by Intel and General Electric come to fruition.

The two giant US companies announced Thursday that they are teaming up to produce a line of medical devices, including one that would allow doctors to remotely monitor patients' health without them needing to visit the doctor's office.

San Francisco  - Confiker, the April Fool's worm, began contacting pre-designated websites for instructions on Wednesday, and while no malicious instructions had been downloaded, security researchers warned that the virus could still wreak havoc at any time.

"It's like a loaded gun that could go off anytime," said Patrik Runald, chief security advisor of technology security firm F-Secure.

Washington  - Discovery astronauts were preparing to undock from the space station later Wednesday to head back to Earth after completing a milestone mission that has doubled the station's capacity.

The mission astronauts installed the fourth and final set of solar panels needed to double power capacity at the station so it can hold six instead of the current three long-term residents - possibly as early as May.

Stockholm  - A website, recently at the centre of a trial in Sweden over alleged illegal file sharing, was Wednesday reported to be launching a potentially controversial service aimed at make people online more anonymous.

The service, known as IPREDator, is available on the Pirate Bay website and allows users to use a special virtual private network (VPN), thereby making their web activity practically untraceable.

Users could sign up for a VPN, currently in a test version, for 5 euros (6.7 dollars) a month.