IBT Staff Reporter

China will continue to export rare earth minerals and said its export controls were for environmental protection reasons, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Thursday, after a government move to cut rare earth export quotas raised fresh international trade concerns.

China shut down more than 60,000 pornographic websites this year, netting almost 5,000 suspects in the process, a government spokesman said on Thursday, vowing no let-up in its campaign against material deemed obscene.

Japanese stocks ended the year with a whimper on Thursday as a stronger yen knocked shares of major exporters lower, but markets elsewhere in Asia rose, cementing solid gains for 2010 led by a near 50 percent rally for Indonesia.

BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion has offered to install a network data analysis system at its premises in India that would help tap data, the Economic Times reported on Thursday, citing an internal note from India's interior ministry.

Intel recently unveiled a smaller line of solid state drive products aimed at dual-drive notebooks and tablets.

A blizzard in the Northeast this weekend postponed about $1 billion in holiday retail sales by keeping shoppers out of stores in the days after Christmas, research firm ShopperTrak said on Wednesday.

Nintendo issues a warning on its Japanese blog that young children should avoid playing the 3DS when 3-D images are in play.

Polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, are man-made chemicals that have been recognized for the last 30 years to be toxic and potentially carcinogenic. They can affect the immune system, reproductive system, nervous system and endocrine system and, if they build up in the body long enough, they can cause cancer.

A federal jury in the Eastern District of Virginia has convicted three members and the national president of a violent motorcycle gang known as the American Outlaw Association (Outlaws) of running a highly organized criminal enterprise, participating in racketeering activities and conspiring to commit violence in aid of racketeering.

Deutsche Bank has entered into a non-prosecution agreement to pay $553.6 million penalty for participating in fraudulent tax shelters that let clients hide billions of dollars from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and dodge taxes, U.S. prosecutors said.

Dey Pharma, a subsidiary of Mylan Inc., has agreed to pay $280 million to the federal government to settle allegations that it had violated the False Claims Act by engaging in a scheme to report false and inflated prices for its products, knowing that federal health care programs relied on those reported prices to set payment rates.

Two former senior executives of Latin Node Inc. (LatiNode), a Miami-based telecommunications company, have been charged with bribing more than $500,000 to Honduran government officials and laundering money.

Increased solar activity could give residents of the continental U.S., southern Europe and Japan the chance to see the northern lights for the first time in several years.

China's move to slash export quotas on rare earth minerals -- vital in a slew of high-tech products -- has raised fresh international trade concerns, and Japan's Sony Corp vowed on Wednesday to reduce its reliance on the minerals.

U.S. prosecutors on Wednesday charged a California woman with leaking secrets about technology companies to two hedge funds in exchange for illegal payments, expanding their probe into insider trading.

JPMorgan Chase & Co and Barclays Plc dropped their opposition to MBIA Inc's plan to restructure its businesses.

Two new 4G phones from HTC leak ahead of their speculative announcement date at the CES.

A computer scientist has adapted a Kinect to control a character in World of Warcraft, but he hopes to see it used in physical therapy also.

Set-top box maker Technicolor said on Wednesday that it will issue new shares worth about 213 million euros to pay back creditors after it failed to sell assets in its restructuring process fast enough.

U.S. Treasuries debt prices should stay firm into year-end, following a strong seven-year note auction on Wednesday, as investors square books ahead of year-end and prepare for Federal Reserve purchases next week.

In an interview to the Daily Mail, Yoko Ono, wife of John Lennon, insisted that she was not responsible for the break-up of 'The Beatles' in 1970.

China's new anti-ship aircraft carrier killer missile has achieved initial operational capability, but that won't affect the United States military's operations in the commercially vital South China Sea, a top U.S. military commander said.

Wall Street executives may face smaller bonuses and a public that still eyes them with suspicion, but that isn't stopping them from rediscovering their love of luxury cars, oceanfront homes and private jets.

The S&P 500 headed for its best December in nearly two decades as U.S. stocks advanced in thin trade on Wednesday, lifted by investor optimism about the economy in 2011.

Beginning in January, 2012, nutrition labels will be required for meats, as they currently are for most other foods, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service.

A California woman has been arrested on charges of leaking secrets about technology companies to hedge funds, as federal prosecutors expand their probe into insider trading.

Amid the chorus of commodity bulls and analysts predicting more rallies in 2011, some expect steep corrections if demand destruction sets in from high prices and big consumer China gets tougher against inflation.

A Japanese newspaper says the Sony Playstation Phone will hit North American and European markets in the spring.

U.S. Treasuries extended price gains on Wednesday, with the 30-year bond rising over a point after a $29 billion auction of seven-year notes saw strong demand.